NUMEROUS documents detailing the spending of millions of dollars at the National Sports Commission (NSC) have gone missing. Chronicle Sport confirmed that the documents are usually kept in the office of former Director of Sport Neil Kumar. Kumar had told high-ranking officials of the Ministry of Sport, including former Minister Frank Anthony, that his office was broken into where the ‘important documents’ were kept.
An official at the NSC was sceptical at giving out much information about the missing documents, but would only state, “It’s true, you can’t find nothing really pertaining to how much money was spent at the NSC. Kumar controlled everything basically”.
Checks to police stations in and around the capital showed that no report of theft at the Homestretch Avenue NSC Office was ever made
Crucial financial documents missing from the NSC
Crucial financial documents missing from the NSC
NUMEROUS documents detailing the spending of millions of dollars at the National Sports Commission (NSC) have gone missing. Chronicle Sport confirmed that the documents are usually kept in the office of former Director of Sport Neil Kumar. Kumar had told high-ranking officials of the Ministry of Sport, including former Minister Frank Anthony, that his office was broken into where the ‘important documents’ were kept.
Former Director of Sport Neil Kumar
An official at the NSC was sceptical at giving out much information about the missing documents, but would only state, “It’s true, you can’t find nothing really pertaining to how much money was spent at the NSC. Kumar controlled everything basically”. Checks to police stations in and around the capital showed that no report of theft at the Homestretch Avenue NSC Office was ever made. Kumar, who sat as Sports Director of the National Sports Commission for the past 23 years, is coming under heavy scrutiny with regard to a number of irregularities at his entity during his PPP/C regime reign in Government. Chronicle Sport reported in its Sunday, May 17 edition of millions of dollars in sport equipment had gone missing from the bond at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall where manager Bashir Khan confirmed that Kumar had collected some ‘stuff’ for a function at the ‘Palms’, that the geriatric home care unit said never happened. According to the National Budget, 2014, a total of $885M was allocated for the NSC. This is in addition to the $2.1B that was acquired over the years. “I would love for the new Government really investigate the NSC because as far as I know, whenever Associations approach for money, they are always told that nothing is there, no equipment is ever there to give, but yet still they collect millions every year and even during the year from the Office of the President,” said the source who also happens to be a board member of the NSC. On December 3, 1993, the National Sports Commission Act was passed in Parliament and the current Board members include Conrad Plummer in the chairman’s seat and the Ex-Officio member is the Director of Sport, Neil Kumar. The other members of the Board are: Vidushi Persaud, Peter Green, Alicia Fortune, Sean Richmond, Peter Abdool, Frank De Abreu, Deputy Permanent Secretary Steve Ninvalle, Hector Edwards, Pradeep Balram and Cheryl Thompson and will serve until 2016. Ninvalle also heads the Guyana Boxing Association (GBA) and oftentimes complain of never even receiving a pair of gloves from the NSC, though the agency (NSC) budget caters for all sport equipment. The rugby and basketball teams had long been crying to the Government through the Ministry of Sport and the NSC, but both Federations had only gotten help from the Office of the President. Meanwhile, questions are pouring in about the millions spent on the Inter-Guiana Games (IGG) over the years. Guyana was set to host the first leg of the 2015 edition in August. Sources say that meetings were already held about how the NSC will go about planning this year’s event and also send a team to the second leg in French Guiana. “The IGG gets in excess of $20M from the NSC but only God knows how the money is spent. It comes from all over, Kumar and his team are clever, so it would be hard now for this new Government to really track where the money is coming from,” said the Board member.