…. Independent Auditor continues to check the books
A private auditor who has been sent to review the books at the state-owned Gravel & Concrete Corporation is apparently causing some anxious moments for some senior staffers in the wake of longstanding reports in the public domain about massive corruption taking place at the company.
Well-placed sources told THE NEW TODAY that the female auditor has been at work since last year meeting with staffers from different departments and soliciting information from them about critical areas of the operation within the body.
A female staffer with over 25 years of working experience at Gravel & Concrete said that some staffers are very uneasy in recent days based on the kind of information that the Auditor is asking to see and the questions being asked of some Heads of Departments.
She was high in praise of the move to engage in what appears to be a comprehensive audit of the statutory body.
“That is the right thing to do (carry out the internal independent audit),” she said.
According to the insider, the presence of the internal auditor has angered some people within the senior management of the company with one of them heard openly using obscene language about the many questions he had to provide answers to following questions posed to him by the Auditor.
He is reported by staffers as saying that he is “f…..ing tired” of the many questions directed at him by the Auditor soliciting information concerning the operations of Gravel & Concrete.
Just over a month ago, Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell, who is the line minister for the company, held his first staff meeting and received several complaints from staffers about certain questionable activities taking place at the state body.
There have been many reports about allegations of financial wrongdoings and other questionable acts by both Board members and staffers.
Some employees have alleged that imported sand from Guyana are leaving the compound especially on Sundays’ without proper authorisation and that concrete blocks that were not paid for are transported on trucks to the homes of certain individuals.
Another report coming from staffers is that some employees are getting free ready-mix concrete without any authorisation to take to their homes to engage in the building of apartments.
THE NEW TODAY also received reports that one senior staffer took the monies belonging to a board member without any permission to help facilitate an overseas trip and had to pay it back.
The insider at the company said she hoped that the person carrying out the Audit will “dig deep” into all aspects of the operations of Gravel & Concrete especially those Departments where corruption is allegedly taking place.
She made mention of the activities of one individual in the senior management who has allegedly been engaged in mass corruption over the years.
“This guy is outrageous,” said the staffer who confirmed that she had approached a Minister in the Congress government to ask him to use his influence to get an independent auditor to come and conduct a probe into the running of the company.
“This guy has done too much for too long and nobody is taking him on – like he has a jumbie – like he does manipulate everybody,” she remarked.
According to the senior staffer, another person within the Management indicated that this individual is suspected to be engaged in “devil worship” but he is not afraid of him since he often reads the book of Psalms and is confident that “nothing can’t do me, they can’t do me anything, my spirit is strong.”
“These guys and them, their hands are not too clean – they know how to manipulate people – not me, I don’t meddle with these guys and them,” she quoted her colleague at the management level, often stating openly.
She herself told THE NEW TODAY: “If I have to ask them a question (pertaining to work) I ask them but to say to associate with these guys and them – I know them – I know these guys from a long time. I have known him for a long time.
“When I spoke to (name of Minister withheld), he said that he would push to get an auditor to come in – it is now happening,” she remarked.
The insider said she is hopeful that the Auditor will ask “the hard questions” to those in management who are suspected to be engaged in corrupt practices.
“They have to ask the hard questions because these guys and them (are) not easy. Ask them the tough questions and let them answer it,” she added.
As regards the senior management staffer who allegedly used a plethora of obscene language in the wake of the presence of the internal auditor, she said: “This one must be vex with the questions they’re asking him because he knows he can’t answer (them) truthfully- he knows that.”
“They know the crime and the things that they put down. They must respond like that – you know anytime you hear people responding like that, that means that you catch them tripping.
“The time is coming for them guys and them – these guys and them do too much and the time is coming for them. Time will catch up on them shortly. Where the chip falls it falls.
“So anybody who knows that they were involved in anything (wrong) they have to stand the consequences, there is no perhaps about that. Too much.”
The senior staffer was in full support of the sending in of an auditor from outside of Gravel & Concrete to do the audit because none of the persons on the staff at the corporation could be trusted to do a good job.
“Nobody could be trusted inside here to carry out this thing – they would have done it but you would not get the correct results,” she quipped.