Show me your motions...
PEEPING TOM
Kaieteur News
June 14, 2004
THERE has been an exchange in the press between chartered accountant and contributor to Stabroek News Business Page, Mr. Christopher Ram, and the Company Secretary of Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL) Ms. R. Vansluytman.
You will recall that on Saturday, Peeping Tom had promised to deal with the dispute concerning financial indicators in the Annual Report for 2003 of the Demerara Distillers Limited. By these I refer to the matters referred to in the exchanges in the letter columns between Ms. Vansluytman and Mr. Ram
However, before I do so there are four things which I would like to address. The first is to recap a point made in Saturday’s article. The second is to discuss the need for Stabroek News in its Business Page article dealing with the DDL accounts to disclose that Mr. Ram was a shareholder in DDL.
Thirdly, I would like to ask the Guyana Securities Council, a very important question. Fourthly, I would like to give my take on comments made by Mr. Ram to the media after the Annual General Meeting held last Friday.
The essential point that I want to repeat from my article of last Saturday is that the Stabroek News Business Page has a limitation. The accounts of companies which are audited by the contributor cannot be analysed.
Therefore, the readership would only be able to read about those companies not audited by the contributor. I had proposed two possible remedies. One was for a wholly new contributor to be found, one who does not audit the books of any local company.
The second option would be to have an additional contributor to deal with those companies audited by the usual contributor. In this way readers would benefit from analysis of the financial accounts of the full spectrum of important companies in Guyana. These suggestions stem from my appreciation that the contributor would be precluded on the basis of professional ethics from publicly writing about accounts which he audits.
The DDL accounts for 2003 were the subject of Mr. Ram’s analysis. Mr. Ram is not the auditor of DDL and thus was not precluded from giving his opinion on these accounts. However it has now been written in the press that Mr. Ram is also a shareholder of DDL and as such Stabroek News ought to have informed its readers that in commenting on the financial accounts of DDL, Mr. Ram is a shareholder i.e. the contributor’s interest in the company being analyzed, however minimal, should have been disclosed to the readers. I hope that Stabroek News considers this.
My reading of the news suggests that the Guyana Securities Council has some issues with DDL. I would like to ask the Guyana Securities Council (GSC) whether it is being advised by anyone on this matter and if any advice come from person or persons who are shareholders of DDL. I ask this because I feel that if this is the case, a possible conflict of interest may arise and this can be problematic for the GSC.
After the Annual General Meeting of last Friday, Mr. Ram was interviewed by the Evening News and he related that he had raised a procedural motion and the Chair had asked that it be seconded. Mr. Ram said that procedural motions do not have to be seconded.
Mr. Ram also said that the motion was put to the floor and this also is not required for procedural motions.
I beg to disagree with Ram on both counts. Now, Peeping Tom may not be a toastmaster. The only toast that I have ever mastered is toast bread, but I do feel that Mr. Ram was wrong in his conclusions about procedural motions. I will explain why.
We must distinguish between what is called procedural motions and points of order. The latter has to do with questions raised with respect to departure from standing orders, the rules governing the meeting, rules of order or customary procedures either in the discussion or in the conduct of the Annual General Meeting. A point of order is usually raised if someone wants to draw attention to a possible procedural mistake made by another member or the Chair.
Points of order are therefore a reaction to a mistake or departure and must be raised at the time the error or departure is made. Points of order do not require a seconder and are dealt with by the Chair.
A procedural motion on the other hand has to do with the procedure to be followed if adopted. For example debate on an issue may have been sufficient and the Chair decides to move a procedural motion to decide whether the debate on the issue should continue or whether the original motion should be put to the vote. Procedural motions are required to be seconded and voted on.
There are many types of procedural motions. And I mention these to make a point about Mr. Ram’s arguments. A procedural motion may ask for a question to be now put or not be put, to postpone the original motion being debated to a later specified time, to refer the subject matter to a committee or sub committee for investigation or report, for a motion to be voted on in specified parts etc. The point that I wish to be observed is that procedural motions deal with what should happen once debate on a motion begins.
According to a report in the Stabroek News of last Saturday, at the commencement of the AGM, some fifteen minutes after the scheduled starting time, Mr. Ram rose to move a procedural motion for three items on the agenda to be deferred. The report gave the impression that this was an originating motion. In my book, this would not constitute a procedural motion.
But even if it were, it would still require a seconder and to be put to the floor.
I will end here for today. Further debate on the report will have to be deferred until tomorrow. And as a columnist I exercise the right of privilege to so do.