Dear Editor,
Well, finally, it seems as though there will be some sort of audit carried out at City Hall in Georgetown.
Of course this audit will be a very small, focused one that will be concentrated on the millions of dollars in funds provided by Central Government to the Georgetown Municipality since 2015.
But, hopefully, the findings of this forensic audit will raise the awareness of, and trigger the effecting of, a much more comprehensive audit of the workings of the Georgetown Municipality. The kind of audit needed at the Georgetown Municipality — because of the protracted period since one was held; because of the enormous sums of money and assets involved; and because of the amount of scandals that have surfaced over time at City Hall — would need to be forensic in nature, and would require gargantuan resources.
The claim made two years ago by the Mayor — that she was open to facilitate any forensic audit, and that the Office of the Auditor General was welcome at any time — was nothing more than spouting hot air. The Audit Office of Guyana has clearly indicated that all attempts to conduct an audit at City Hall were frustrated and were stymied by documents not being provided. It is time for this charade to be put to an end.
To further throw dust in the eyes of the citizenry, the City Council had set up a fully staffed Internal Audit Department. This turned out to be a complete waste of time and revenue earned from ratepayers, as these persons just sat and idled all day long whilst receiving fat salaries for doing little or nothing.
Auditing City Hall would require the engagement of several experienced and capable accounting and auditing firms, as the load would simply be just too much for the Audit Office of Guyana. Over the last two decades, many things have been hidden, destroyed and misplaced. Crooked contracts will have to be examined; equipment that has gone missing will have to be traced; persons illegally given interest waivers will have to be pursued and made to pay their correct dues; equipment that has been sent to do private jobs, including work at officers’ residences, will have to be paid for; municipal equipment that was sold dirt cheap would need to be properly assessed, and the proper prices paid for them; municipal property sold or leased when that should not have been needs to be retrieved. Oh, the task would be titanic, but it must be done.
Corruption is a true enemy to development, and fighting it at City Hall would not be a one-day or one-time affair.
Best regards,
Deodarie Putulall
