Latest update February 16th, 2025 7:49 PM
Aug 20, 2019 News
The Local Government Commission (LGC) has written to several Town Councils and Neighbourhood Democratic Councils (NDCs) requesting that they settle outstanding balances owed to the National Insurance Scheme (NIS).
At the top of the list is the Mayor and City Council (M&CC) of Georgetown, followed by the Golden Grove / Diamond NDC, Queenstown Local Authority Essequibo, Charity / Urasara NDC , Bartica Town Council ,Port Kaituma / Matthews Ridge / Arakaka NDC , Mabaruma Town Council, Buxton / Friendship NDC , and Beterverwagting / Triumph NDC.
Chairman of the LGC, Mortimer Mingo, told Kaieteur News that the Commission was not at liberty to divulge the sum of money owed by each Local Government Organ. The total monies owed is estimated to be in hundreds of millions.
Mingo explained that about a month ago, the LGC received a letter from the General Manager of the NIS requesting the intervention of the Commission to get the various NDCs and municipalities to settle the large sums of monies owed to the scheme.
According to Mingo, the LGC has been notified that a number of local government organs would deduct NIS contributions from their employees but fail to remit those monies to NIS.
“The Commission has written to the various Town Councils and NDCs to remind them of their statutory responsibility to remit those contributions to NIS…; we also reminded them of the need to clear the monies owed to the Scheme.”
The LGC Chairman added that, “If these Councils and NDC continue to ignore the advice of the Commission, NIS reserves the right to take legal recourse against them.”
Last week, Town Clerk (ag) Sherry Jerrick, informed the Councillors of the Georgetown M&CC of the LGC’s intention to have the Council clear its debt to NIS. The M&CC debt is in excess of $200M.
During a statutory meeting held at City Hall, Jerrick noted that the Commission had asked that the Council to pay the monthly contributions of employees regularly. Jerrick furnished the Council with a letter signed by LGC Chairman Mingo.
According to Jerrick, the letter outlined that the Georgetown M&CC’s current debt to NIS is $218,416,918. She noted that the correspondence served to remind the Council that non–payment of the contributions would result in loss of benefits for City Hall staffers.
In addition, Jerrick noted the letter emphasised the statutory obligations of M&CC to pay current contributions on behalf of the employees when they fall due.
Further alluding to the letter, Jerrick said the LGC warned that, “It should be recognised that through the non-payment and corresponding non-submission of schedules, the stated debt continues to increase”.
In keeping with powers vested in the Local Government Commission Act of 2013, she said that the Commission had therefore instructed that the M&CC “submit to NIS payments submission of the mentioned outstanding remittance to enable computation of the real debt and further to actualise the settlement of the debt on or before August 12, 2019.”
Jerrick said too that the Commission has requested monthly status updates as it regards the payment of City Council debt and the monthly remittance of employees’ NIS deducted.
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