Mauritaro residents call for Toshao’s head

ALLEGATIONS of fraud continue to build against Mauritaro Toshao, Ms. Loretta Fiedtkou and
public pressure is mounting for the Irfaan Ali government to get rid of her.
Former Treasurer and now Councillor, Cheryl Fiedtkou (no relation) accused her namesake of
failing to pay statutory royalties from her logging business and not accounting for millions paid
to the Council over a five year period.
Documents seen by www.aroundtheregioms.com have substantiated many of the Councillor’s
claims.
Muritaro residents reached by this media house made many uncomplimentary remarks about the
serving Toshao.
Cheryl revealed that the Region Ten community received $3M from the David Granger
government in 2015 to acquire a boat and engine. While the latter was acquired for $952,000
mystery surrounds the remaining sum.
It was also revealed that the community had received several millions over a period of time from
well-known logger and businessman known only as Mr. Sookram. However, those monies too
cannot be traced and despite several letters demanding an explanation, and calls by residents and
fellow Councillors for accountability, the Toshao continues to ignore them.
Three days before the life of the Council expired, Sookram handed over another $1M. Yet, no
records or the money can be traced.
“I had personally handed over the money to Mr. Owen Bowling who took over as the Treasurer.
But we do not know what has become of the $1M. Mr. Sookaram also told us that he had paid
Toshao $2.9M and once again there is no evidence of what the money was used for. The Toshao
also collected a Grant which was $1.5M which was the Jubilee Grant to do revetment work at the
mission and yet again nothing was done,” Councillor Fiedtkou said.

Several residents also complained of not receiving payments for work done on community
projects. They were promised payment of $3,000.00 per day but only some received. Two years
after the bulk of the workers is still waiting.
“She claimed that the monies were used to pay the workers for the building of the walkway, but
we know that this wasn’t true. What we know is that indeed she bought some cement but her
claims of buying 60 tons of stones isn’t true as we were the ones who went to the Saeba where
the quarry is and picked up the fine stones so as to ensure that this project was executed. We
picked up the fine stones and that is how we were able to build the walkway. We never paid for
the fine stones and a number of us is still to be paid and Mr. Bowling, who is the Treasurer, is not
saying anything,” Fiedtkou said.
There is a two-year hiatus since the last Council meeting, and the Toshao is showing no appetite
to face leaders.
“The last time that we had a council meeting was in 2019. The first petition was presented to the
(former) Minister of Amerindian Affairs Sydney Allicock but nothing was done and during the
campaign there are two current serving Ministers who had promised the villagers that should
they win the election they would make it a priority to address this matter with urgency. The
(PPPC) won the election but it seems as though they have forgotten their promise that they made
to us. We are very disappointed especially in the two ministers but now that they are ministers,
we are still waiting to see them. They have failed in their promise and this isn’t the way to treat
those who passionately supported your party,” the emotional Mauritaro resident said.
Mauritaro residents voted overwhelmingly for the incumbent administration in the 2020 General
and Regional polls and now feel betrayed.
“We are like sheep without a shepherd and the residents are watching to see what the
government will do regarding this situation as we voted wholeheartedly for this current
government and we are now like beggars crying out to them to address our concerns,” the former
Treasurer said.