Post office should not have cashed vouchers without specimen -Shadick
4,000 fakes paid in Sept alone
By Nigel Williams
Stabroek News
November 8, 2002
As the probe into the cashing of fake old age pension vouchers intensifies, Social Security Minister Bibi Shadick on Wednesday said that the post office corporation should not have made payments without first seeing a specimen.
The Minister within the Ministry of Labour, Human Services and Social Security was reacting to a statement by Chairman of the Guyana Post Office Corporation (GPOC), Bishop Juan Edghill on Tuesday that the corporation was at a disadvantage in tackling the scam because it had not seen a specimen of the vouchers.
"When the ministry introduced the new system of paying Old Age Pension we had requested from the ministry a specimen of the new vouchers but was told at the highest level that we had no need for that and also for their own security and safety mechanism they did not want that to be made known to the corporation so we went along with that decision", Edghill had said.
On Wednesday, Shadick told Stabroek News: "I am not aware of something like that. I think that it was bad judgement on the part of GPOC to go ahead and pay something that they had no knowledge about." Shadick said, "I find it hard to believe, how could one agree to pay something that he has never seen?"
The minister noted that she has since investigated GPOC's claims and that as far as she is aware she did not refuse to give the specimen copy to GPOC.
At the GPOC press conference, senior officers within the ministry were accused of being the ones who took the vouchers in bulk to the post offices for them to be encashed. Shadick told this newspaper that she was not all that dismayed at the findings since she had always held the view that senior officers within her ministry were involved.
"That's why as soon as I got into office I decided to clean up the system. I insisted in printing new booklets, changing the printer and also changing some of the security features on the old booklet." She said that there was evidence that the old list of pensioners was padded. She said scrutiny of the list revealed that some 6,000 non-existent persons were assigned pensions of $1,720 on a monthly basis. As a result, a new system was introduced earlier this year and new pension books printed. It was these books which were forged and used to draw cash recently at post offices.
According to Shadick, while she accepts that there was some level of collaboration with her officers and the postmasters she is concerned as to why her accounts personnel were not able to detect the fraud. She said that every month the ministry would receive a financial statement from the post office stating how much money was paid out by the corporation. She said that this figure would then be reconciled with her accounts personnel.
However, Shadick said both GPOC and her accounting officers should have detected the rise in the payments each month. She said for the month of September alone some 4,000 fraudulent vouchers were cashed at post offices. Shadick said many persons would have to be questioned including accounting staff. She warned that, if anyone is found culpable that person would be dealt with condignly.
She said that the owner of the West Demerara printery which made the new voucher was also called in for questioning by the Auditor General. She however said that it was quite clear that it was not this printery which reproduced the fraudulent booklets since those vouchers were of a different quality. Shadick mentioned that in the past it was found that the Guyana National Printers Limited (GNPL) had been printing extra booklets. She said in that case those who were involved in the malpractice were able to get off since the vouchers were authentic ones, only that they were unauthorised copies.
Additionally, the minister said her ministry had cause to terminate the contract of a man who was responsible for collecting the vouchers after they had been encashed. She said that since the scam was made public she felt that the contractor should have detected the fraudulent vouchers since he was the one who had been dealing with them.
The ministry usually pays the corporation $40 for every voucher it encashes.
She was confident that the new system that she had introduced was capable of minimising the level of fraudulent practices that prevailed in the old system.
The minister warned those who are involved in the scam to desist, adding that it is time citizens practise loyalty to the state and be honest.
