The Gaming Authority and the world of unknowns

Dear Editor,

Howard Zinn (author of You Can’t be Neutral on a Moving Train), while speaking at a political event in the United States had the following to say on pronouncements by former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The Secretary had explained the threats to the West as being invisible and unidentifiable, and Zinn then went on to quote him directly: “‘There are things that we know and there are known unknowns, that is to say there are things we now know that we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. These are things we do not know we do not know.’ Rumsfeld goes on to say, simply because you do not have evidence that something exists does not mean that you have evidence that it doesn’t exist.”

The waffling pronouncements from the Gaming Authority over the last three weeks are like Rumsfeld quotes, logically inexplicable, defying legal specificity and lacking cognitive clarity; thus, taking us into Rumsfeld’s world of known unknowns and unknown unknowns.

The Kaieteur News article dated September 25, 2017, captioned ‘Gaming Authority has every right to ensure the integrity of individuals seeking casino licences’ quoted Roysdale Forde, Chairman of the Gaming Authority, as making the following preposterous assertion: “The Guyana Constitution dictates that any company that is to be granted a casino licence must be deemed wholly ‘fit and proper.’”

Deeper down the rabbit hole, we have a contorted article published by Stabroek News, dated September 30, 2017, and captioned ‘Sleep-In, directors asked to submit seven years of tax returns for casino application’. Reference was made in the article to Section 29A and Section 32(1) of the Gambling Prevention Act, stating that the Gaming Authority has the power to request directors’ income tax returns; then by an invisible or undocumented leap of logic, Mr Forde notes that these amendments are contained in the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (Amendment) Act (AMFCFT Act). When did the Minister of Finance appoint the Gaming Authority as the supervising authority for casinos, betting shops and lotteries, an appointment required by the AMLCFT Act, or can other Acts be subverted to provide a legal permit for the Gaming Authority to utilize, when assessing an application for