Special audit to be done on Larry London’s birth certificates contract – AG

…as Attorney General requests forensic audit

The contract that the former A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Government granted to businessman Larry London to print birth certificates, will be the subject of a special audit.

This was confirmed in an interview with Auditor General Deodat Sharma, who explained that the contract is being audited as part of the 2019 audit cycle. While Sharma could not share details on the audit, he assured that it will form part of the 2019 Audit Report of Guyana. However, he noted that they are likely to also do a special audit on the contract.
“We have started something already, its part of my 2019 audit, so I’m glad it was brought to attention in Parliament… which I’m finalising. And we’re doing a special audit of it,” Sharma explained.
With respect to the release of the 2019 report, Sharma explained that COVID-10 has created an unprecedented environment. It is therefore likely that the report will be released later than its usual September 30.

Forensic audit
However, Attorney General Anil Nandlall has written to the Auditor General requesting that an immediate forensic audit be commissioned to examine the facts and circumstances surrounding the contract awarded to Larry London to print birth certificates by the A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Administration.

Nandlall, in a letter to Sharma, asked that the contract between the then Department of Citizenship and Universal Procurement Services Inc – which is operated by London in Florida – be audited to answer a number of questions.
The audit should be able to tell whether there was compliance with the provisions of the Procurement Act and if there was non-compliance then the reasons must be stated; reasons why the services of the conventional publisher of the birth certificates were not sought; had the services of the conventional publisher be retained then what would have been the estimated cost to print and publish the same documents.
Additionally, the Audit Office is tasked with determining the status of London’s company at the time when he entered into contract with the Winston Felix-led Department of Citizenship; what was the company’s main line of business; its experience in the field of services it was providing to the Government.

The report would also answer the questions as to whether due diligence was done before the David Granger-led Government retained the services of London; whether the department needed 100,000 birth certificate forms at the time of the contract and the quality of the documents that were produced.

Bombshell revelation
The bombshell revelation was made on Monday, during the first day of the examination of the budget estimates for what was previously the Ministry of Citizenship headed by Felix.
Governance Minister Gail Teixeira was asked about a $29.1 million allocation under line item 6224, page 46 of the 2020 estimates.
Under questioning from Member of Parliament (MP) Sanjeev Datadin, Teixeira revealed that the amount relates to a Florida-based company called Universal Procurement Services. According to Teixeira, the company received a contract to print thousands of birth certificates for the Ministry of Citizenship.
Describing the contract as unusual and strange, Teixeira went on to reveal that controversial businessman London is the principal of the company. Teixeira, a former Home Affairs Minister with oversight for citizenship, noted that previously it was the local printers who received such contracts.
The company itself, Universal Procurement Services, was registered with Florida’s Division of Corporations. London is listed as one of three directors. However, a perusal of the database shows that the company’s status is, in fact, inactive.
London has been the subject of numerous articles, dating as far back as his involvement in the controversial D’Urban Park project. Lambasted on all sides for its lack of transparency and its structural defects, D’Urban Park was built through the coordination of Homestretch Development Incorporated (HDI) – a company co-owned by London.
Public funds for the project, which cost a total of over $1 billion, was scraped from multiple avenues by the former APNU/AFC Government and handed over to HDI. Yet to this day, the former APNU/AFC Government has been unable to account for how the monies were spent despite the best efforts of the Audit Office of Guyana to reconcile the payments over the past few years.
Auditor General Sharma had written in his latest audit report that in 2015, $36.5 million was withdrawn from the Lotto Fund to fund D’Urban Park, however, no payment vouchers were presented to his auditors for that transaction.
In 2016, a further $60.3 million was pulled from the money allocated for infrastructural development. In addition, $118.1 million was pulled from the money allocated to the Ministry for the maintenance of roads.
And in 2017, $500 million was paid to HDI from the funds budgeted to the Public Infrastructure Ministry for infrastructural development. A further $28.2 million came from the money for the maintenance of other infrastructure.
The Government also withdrew two sets of monies totalling over $400 million from the Contingency Fund, which is supposed to only be used for emergency purposes. However, over $70 million in payment vouchers were not presented to the Audit Office.
In addition to public funds, it is understood that private donations were also received by HDI to carry out the project. All this happened with Working People’s Alliance (WPA) stalwart Dr Rupert Roopnaraine sitting as a Director on HDI.
Most recently, London was revealed to have been appointed by the former Government as Director of Parks, a position APNU/AFC created especially for him that came with a salary of $500,000 plus benefits that included gratuity, security at his home, light, phone and internet bills paid, as well as duty-free allowance. (G3)