President Irfan Ali and the PPP have an opportunity to be on the side of law and order and ensure the revelations in the Vice News Report are thoroughly investigated and allow the law to take its course.
This is the assertion of Leader of the Opposition, Aubrey Norton. Norton at a news conference Tuesday afternoon said for Ali and the PPP/C to do otherwise is to be accused of complicity with the alleged crimes of bribery and corruption that VP Jagdeo is being accused of.
During a Vice News documentary “Guyana for Sale” which premiered on Sunday Jagdeo’s Chinese tenant and “friend” businessman, Su Zhi Rong is heard in the interview accusing Jagdeo of allegedly accepting bribes for large developmental projects ndertaken in the country. Jagdeo has denied the allegations and has since signaled that he will take legal action against the Chinese businessman and also promised to evict him from his property.
Jagdeo told the undercover Vice News reporters that he gives his Chinese friend all the support needed to facilitate investment transactions and that he has no dealings with finances given his role in government. “No, no, no I’m not getting involved in business. Su is my friend. He gets all the support. Su deals with all the agreements. I don’t. The thing is that my thing is that I’m in government, so I assist from government side.”
The Vice reporter was told that Su was the man that could get her a meeting with Vice President and so he did to prove his connection with the government official, and that any money reportedly paid for bribes to the VP would indeed get to him.
When the Vice News team first met Su, he boasted about his relationship with Jagdeo and that he could secure the meeting since he has a close relationship with the government official. “If you want anything done in Guyana you have to have some connections,” he told the Vice team. “You tell me, it should be no problem. I am very close with the Vice President and the other officials,” the documentary’s subtitle read translating Mandarin to English.
Norton told the news conference at a time when Guyana is poised to earn significant income from its oil and gas sector, it is imperative that action be taken to ensure that a good national example is set. “Failure to address the allegations against the VP will signal to all in Guyana that bribery and corruption are condoned by the PPP government. It is also an indication that the PPP is self-imposing the Dutch disease on Guyana. It is even more worrying when it is noted that VP Jagdeo himself says that “people are coming to Guyana to make money.” How crude! While investors are, and must be welcomed to Guyana, it should not be entertained outside of the confines of the law and authorised offices. From the revelations in the Vice News Report, it is clear that the VP, as a senior government official, is purportedly guaranteeing foreign investors the support of the PPP government outside of the confines of the law and his authority.” Norton said this is a clear indication that the state is being further criminalised and not being accountable, a distinction it gained when it was last in government. It is in this context that we must view the government’s unwillingness to establish the Procurement Commission and their passing a Motion in Parliament that puts control of the quorum of the Public Accounts Committee in the hands of the government, which was never the intention of Parliament. Clearly the PPP does not want any transparency, accountability and the rule of law in Guyana. “The Leader of the Opposition condemns the actions of the PPP in reversing all the measures put in place by the APNUAFC to ensure transparency and accountability and calls on the government to take immediate action to bring a halt to every accusation of high level of corruption in government. The Leader of the Opposition believes that VP Jagdeo should do the decent thing and resign to facilitate an unbiased investigation. Failure to do so should result in the President relieving him of his appointment as Vice President and ordering a full
investigation into the allegations against him. Failure of the President to do so will further indicate that the PPP is a corrupt outfit that does not only facilitate corruption, but is itself corrupt.”
