Dear Editor,
BEFORE the March 2020 General and Regional Elections (GRE) in Guyana, the then leader of the opposition and now “illegal” opposition leader used to threaten our nation that if he and his party do not have their way at the GRE, he and his party supporters won’t take it lightly. He also mentioned on several occasions that they will write and call on the international community, especially the United States, to impose sanctions on the APNU+AFC officials and all their backers (don’t know what he meant by that).
The illegal opposition leader then started to ensure that his partyís financiers start singing to his tune with the same beat and only verse of his “sanction Guyana America sanction, sanction APNU+AFC only”. The Private Sector Commission (PSC) chair was then ordered to and dance to the tune of Bharrat, while he was also instructed to write and make all sorts of wild accusations against GECOM and APNU+AFC. Recently I heard and saw my friends addressing him as “Sanction Jerry.”
The illegal opposition leader also gets the GCCI and a number of his party financiers singing the same sanction tune. They continue in making all kinds of statements calling on the US and other international organisations to drop several penalties on the APNU+AFC officials and the government.
Why is all this being done, especially the call for sanctions by the PPP, PSC (ìSanctions Jerryî) and others?. Because the PPP as I have said before had invested a lot of money into the elections and cannot afford to lose it. I have also said before that the PPP made a lot of promises to its financiers and has to ensure that they are being repaid through those promises.
We recently saw/read Mr Adam Harris talk about the GRA and ìSanctions Jerryî concerning some 350,000,000 Guyana Dollars he owes to GRA and the matter is in the courts. Maybe that’s a tiny worm that just tickles ìSanction Jerry,î that’s why he has been so vocal in calling for sanctions. Maybe he promised to have that 350 million tax dollars being dropped into his pocket and not paid to the state. Maybe we will hear very soon of the others who are trying to evade taxes, largely within Guyana.
I do believe strongly that the United States, the international organisations, the Commonwealth and by extension all the observer groups/missions at the March 2020 GRE will not tolerate or encourage anyone to rob their country of its fair share of taxes. The call for sanctions and for them to be imposed asap on the APNU+AFC officials is a dead call. This call is sending the wrong message to the world at large after what took place at the
GECOM tabulation centre during the counting of ballots a few days after the GRE.
The PPP knows it very well that they invested heavily to corrupt the electoral progress and by far had planned this in such a way, that when they start to make their shout the world will believe them. The PPP started to talk of “rigging” months before the elections and that they have information on such. To date, they have not produced one evidence of voters fraud, because that’s the only way how an election can be rigged. The US and all other organisations must take a deep look into the PPP because of weeks before the GRE in Guyana, the PPP GS Bharrat Jagdeo was accused of internally “rigging” its party presidential election process and turn it into a selection process.
The illegal opposition leader tries to do the same with the March 2020 GRE.
If one is to check the history of Region Four voting patterns, they would have known that Region Four votes are the largest and the deciding factor/votes as to the winner of the General Elections. We need to understand that a party can win six regions during the GRE but yet go on to lose the general elections because of the number of votes they win those regions by and the remaining votes within the other regions that they lose by. We heard and saw the actions of the PPP, the APNU+AFC, the smaller parties the observers locally and internationally and GECOM ; we all know what went wrong and who are the ones who started the trouble during tabulation of the Region Four votes.
The matter was taken to the courts and they did their part. GECOM decided to have all the votes recounted region by region in an orderly manner. CARICOM will be observing the process because we need to remember that the courts ruled that only GECOM has the right to supervise the recount/elections and there will be other observers during the recount.
Now the PPP is trying to stall the process in every way they can by ordering that GECOM start with Region Four, that the recounting be live-streamed, that GECOM disobey the first set of final regional declarations, that the RO of Region Four and the CEO of GECOM be axed from the process. These are all jiggery- pokery demands to stall the process.
Why start with Region Four, when Regions One,Two,Three,Five,Six and Nine allegedly have voters fraud?. Why must the process be live-streamed when there will be CARICOM and international observers? Or is it that the PPP is now saying that they don’t trust CARICOM officials and the international observers?. Why would GECOM want to disobey the first set of final regional declarations when there is no other declaration as yet?. Why would GECOM axe only the Region Four RO when six other ROs are implicated in voters fraud?. Why would GECOM want to axe its CEO from the process when he is being fair?.
We should all call on the US Government and all the international organisations to take a close look at what’s happening and going to happen during the recount and then see and know who are the ones after power in Guyana at all cost.
Why would the US want to only listen to the PPP and drop sanctions on the APNU+AFC officials and all who the PPP wants to be sanctioned?. I don’t think the US would believe that the PPP is a clean-hands party when we know all that they did in the past as a government and continue doing it through their financiers. The PPP is making a mockery of the US by calling on them to sanction APNU+AFC officials only. If any sanction has to be implemented it should include Bharrat Jagdeo, Anil Nandlall,î Sanction Jerryî (PSC), several executives of the small parties, several PPP financiers and several others, including Irfaan Ali for imposing and being the self-proclaimed President-elect of a country which can put the nation at serious risk and mostly which is unconstitutional and illegal for him to do so.
I am also waiting on the US government and US ambassador to denounce the self-proclaimed President-elect Irfaan Ali, because this is another a matter that can be considered as fraud by impersonating who he is not. GECOM is the only independent constitutional body that can declare a winner for any GRE in Guyana and not the PPP or anyone else. Let’s wait and see what will happen after the recount is completed and the world, including the United States, will know who are the ones who wanted to rig the elections.
NO TO DICTATORSHIP.
Regards
Abel Seetaram
Source: https://issuu.com/guyanachroniclee-paper/docs/guyana_chronicle_e-paper_4-29-2020