Barama can exercise right to appeal – PM

Barama can exercise right to appeal – PM
Kaieteur News, 24 October 2007

Barama may appeal a massive and unprecedented fine levied against it by
the Guyana Forestry Commission earlier this week.

Responding to questions on the decision to sanction the logging giant
for under declaring its forest produce and for falsifying its records
of origin of logs, Prime Minister Samuel Hinds admitted that the
company can follow its rights to appeal.

Yesterday, the company remained mum on the findings and the hefty $96
million fine and indicated that it will be issuing a statement,
possibly by today.

However, Kaieteur News understands that the company will appeal and is
willing to call in international auditors to clear its name, echoing
statements made within the last few weeks.

On September 25, the Minister of Agriculture with responsibility for
Forestry, Robert Persaud, announced that an investigation had been
launched by the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC), the agency
responsible for the management of the State Forest Resources of
approximately 13.8 million hectares.

The investigation was centered on suspected cases of under declaration
of forest produce harvested and false declaration as to the origin of
forest produce harvested.

Last month, Minister Persaud, and Commissioner of Forestry James Singh,
announced that it had started investigations into cases of
irregularities by a number of loggers.

The officials also disclosed that a few of their staff may also be
colluding with the loggers.

President Bharrat Jagdeo later tapped Barama as one of the companies
being investigated.

In a press release on Monday, the GFC said that during its probe it
discovered breaches in procedures involving Barama Company Limited, A.
Mazaharally and Sons Limited, Barakat Timbers Limited and N. Sukul and
Sons.

“In conducting the investigation, a detailed analysis of records was
done, including a comparison of the documentation supplied to the GFC
by the companies with the internal records of the companies,” said the
statement.

GFC Monitoring Teams also went into the concession areas to quantify
the extent of the breaches, and to determine if there were additional
breaches. “The results of the investigation confirmed the GFC initial
findings that there was under declaration of forest produce harvested,
as well as false declaration with respect to the origin of the logs
harvested.”

Highlighting several instances of recorded irregularities, GFC said it
communicated the findings of the investigation to the Minister of
Agriculture who then directed that these be shared with the four
companies for written responses to the identified breach of procedures.

“All four companies submitted responses, but did not adequately address
the concerns outlined by the GFC,” said the release.

All sub-contractual operations of Barama Company Limited were ordered
suspended with A. Mazaharally and Sons, N. Sukul and Sons and Barakat
Timbers Limited.

Two GFC Field Officers who were accused of contributing to the breaches
of procedures while stationed at the areas have been dismissed.