Afra Raymond, an anti-corruption spokesperson and president of the Joint Consultative Council for the Construction Industry (JCC), said illegal offshore banking activities may not affect T&T in any significant way because this country is not considered an attractive location for setting up offshore accounts."Those other countries have very beneficial tax regimes. If you register your company in St Lucia, you do not have to pay taxes," he told the T&T Guardian yesterday.
Raymond's comments followed international reports of a growing number of UK companies setting up offshore banking accounts in several countries including the small Caribbean territories, the British Virgin Islands and Nevis. Reports said that many of thescompanies have posts for directors that are sham and were only been created for the purpose of setting up foreign accounts, many times for shady activities.
Raymond, who has challenged the Ministry of Finance in court about how the Clico bailout was conducted, said proper anti money laundering procedures need to be in place. "Anti money laundering safeguards needed to be put in place with regards to the Clico bailout. They were never put in place for people who are applying for benefits from the bailout to satisfy those safeguards and I think that is regrettable," he said.
Last week, officials of English speaking Caribbean territories met in Antigua to brainstorm ways of strengthening anti money laundering efforts.Raymond said successive Governments are to be blamed for this in T&T."And it is not just the People's Partnership regime but the adminstration before. This has been going on for years and it is a lost opportunity to purge the system of some of the grey and questionable money in the system," he said.He called on the government to take action.
"I think all those anti money laundering speeches and initiatives they have been speaking about, they need to have it as part of the bailout. You had a situation of people putting money ito Clico and applicants for the bailout fund should be able to satisfy certain requirements along those lines and that has not happened," Raymond said.