Latest update November 9th, 2024 1:00 AM
May 25, 2013 News
The government has all but failed in efforts to get the opposition to rush amendments to the law against financial crimes to avoid a blacklist being imposed next week in Nicaragua.
Head of the Financial Intelligence Unit, Paul Geer, and a state attorney were expected to defend Guyana’s case, but the government has roped in Attorney General Anil Nandlall to seek an extension.
“When momma dry, you gaffo suck granny,” is how government’s chief spokesman Dr. Roger Luncheon chose to describe the move to have Nandlall travel to the Nicaraguan capital, Managua.
President Donald Ramotar had appealed to Parliamentarians to expedite their work on the amendments in a Special Parliamentary Committee and take their report for a vote in the National Assembly by May 28, the latest.
A sitting of the House was originally set for that date when the House adjourned last Wednesday, but that sitting was postponed to June 13. The House can convene in a special sitting to take the vote if the committee completes its work, but that is unlikely to happen as the committee is due to hold its next meeting until June 12.
The government wanted the amendments to the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (Amendment) Bill 2013 (AML/CFT) passed before it faces the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) review panel in Managua starting Monday.
The CFATF is an arm of the International Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an independent inter-governmental body that develops and promotes policies to protect the global financial system against money laundering and terrorist financing, among other financial crimes.
The CFATF had required that the country amend a range of laws. Amendments to the various laws were lumped together and taken to the House as the AML/CFT Amendment Bill.
The amendments were needed to reduce structural, legislative and administrative deficiencies in the anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism architecture and to meet the international standards established to protect the international financial and banking systems.
The government insisted that without passing the amendments before Guyana faces the review, severe sanctions that would have a range of implications for the financial sector especially, including humbugs in the flow of international funds, such as remittances and wire transfers.
In an unprecedented move, Ramotar, on Wednesday sent a message to the National Assembly appealing to all sides of the House to urgently review amendments to the law on financial crimes so that the country can avoid the international financial blacklist.
The two opposition parties had said that they would not rush consideration of the amendments.
The seven-seat Alliance for Change (AFC), which holds the balance of power in the National Assembly, is sticking to its demands.
The party has said it would exchange its support for the amendments only if the government provides a definitive deadline for the setting up of the Public Procurement Commission and if the President re-considers assenting to two Bills which were brought to the House by the opposition and passed.
The opposition is adamant that the Government’s recklessness in the management of the country’s national and international affairs is what has led to what is being described as a crisis situation, but the opposition said the blame lies squarely at the feet of the government for wanting to give the people’s elected representatives dribbles of information.
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