The Guyana Government will soon be establishing a Compliance Commission that will supervise the operations of agencies and/or sectors in the country that currently do not have a direct regulatory body.
This is according to Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister, Anil Nandlall, during his programme, “Issues In the News”.
Nandlall explained that the Guyana Compliance Commission Bill 2023, which is expected to the tabled in the National Assembly soon, seeks to address the gaps in Guyana’s finance sector in accordance with Anti-Money Laundering/Countering the Financing of Terrorism stipulations.
“In our AML/CFT structure, it has been recognised that there are agencies that have no regulator or supervisors to regulate them. We have been forced to use agencies that are not really regulator or supervisor to perform these functions and it has not been very effective. The system remains weak,” he explained.
“Take for example the auto sale industry. The GRA issues certificates of registration, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the GRA can regulate that industry or can supervise that industry. GRA function is one of taxation and revenue collection, it doesn’t have a supervisory role over the taxpayer other that what the individual statues confer upon it,” he said.
“We are going to set up a commission called a Compliance Commission and where ever one cannot find a proper regulator or a proper supervisor for any given area of economic and financial activity, this Compliance Commission will act as the regulator and as the supervisor. And that will make us compliant fully with international standard by CFATF (Caribbean Financial Action Task Force) and the financial action taskforce,” he noted.
This bill is part of a slew of legislation being introduced by the Guyana Government ahead of the country’s upcoming AML/CFT onsite evaluation and examination in September.
