Team Mohamed and the PPP wake up call

Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo is on another crusade. In fact, he is always on a crusade. He, like some people, has the unenvious task of finding subjects for discussion every week. In the not too distant past, topics were easy to come by. The PNCR press conferences provided fodder. But the PNCR shifted the press conferences to Friday. Jagdeo had to turn to another source for his discussion topics. He turned to the social media platforms and began to concentrate on the various social media commentators.

Rickford Burke, Mark Benschop, and any other critic of the People’s Progressive Party became food for Jagdeo’s discussion forum. The ad hominem attacks were many and at times humorous. Rickford Burke, a perennial critic of Jagdeo and the PPP suddenly found himself facing a battery of charges in Guyana. There was a charge of extortion, another of cyberbullying and some other.

Benschop was spared charges but the five years he spent in the Camp Street jail constantly came up. Still fresh in recent memory is the allegation that Benschop was a drag queen in jail. Of course, the PNCR and some of the leaders were never far from the talking points. So too was the Alliance For Change. Nigel Hughes was accused of procuring state land during the tenure of the PNCR. His wife, Cathy Hughes, was also singled out.

The new targets are the Mohameds—Nazar and his son, Azruddin. As Nazar said on a recent social media broadcast, he was a staunch supporter of the People’s Progressive Party. He spoke of funding the party and of being close to the founder, the late Dr Cheddi Jagan. The bottom fell out of the relationship with the PPP when the United States sanctioned the Mohameds and their companies.

Then other things happened. The Mohameds, particularly young Azruddin, decided that he would not sit back and allow what the family had built to go to waste. He became a philanthropist. He started to help people in need. He built homes for some and provided financial support for others. As could be expected, his actions caught the attention of the ruling PPP who began to hear the reaction of the people.

People complained to Azruddin Mohamed and the PPP began to take note. There were choice words and phrases for the ruling party. Of course, among the choice phrases was the comment by people perceived to be PPP supporters not voting. That was the panic alarm for the PPP. Mere weeks earlier, Azruddin Mohamed was nothing but a man helping people and of no worry to the PPP. In fact, Jagdeo was fulsome in his praise for Azruddin.

That changed drastically when people began to gravitate to the Mohameds, to the exclusion of the PPP. It was time to turn the state apparatus on them.

Suddenly it turned out that the Mohameds owed the state millions of dollars. The transaction on a car was supposedly made four years earlier. There were supposedly other transactions. How could these have passed undetected?

Was there corruption in the revenue agency? Why did this take four years to surface and only when Azruddin posed a real threat to Jagdeo and the PPP? Why did Jagdeo have to initiate this action? This just goes to show that the law enforcement arms are politicised. They operate at the beck and call of the government. Professionalism has gone through the window.

The Guyana Revenue Authority, if the reports are accurate, must explain why whatever fraudulent activity that occurred four years ago, has only now surfaced? There was a time when President Irfaan Ali used a vehicle loaned by the Mohameds as a state operated Presidential vehicle. Of course there was a denial until the photographs emerged.

Meanwhile Azruddin is crisscrossing the country increasingly incurring Jagdeo’s anger. He was at Lima Sands on the Essequibo Coast last week and again at Dartmouth, also on the Essequibo Coast. The response was heartening but not for the PPP.

Jagdeo was at his best. He said that he met Azruddin and that the young man couldn’t string some sentences together. He then said that if Azruddin was to confront APNU, he Azruddin, would soil himself by the bucket load. Of course he did not put it as nicely. The people have a right to be fed up with the PPP. Most of the money is going to the friends and families of the party.

The relatives of Ministers have multiple companies that win government contracts ahead of legitimate bidders. Sadly, the contracts are poorly executed, but the government doesn’t care. The majority of the population is hungry but again the government doesn’t care. Roads and bridges are more important than people.

Just the other day, the scandal of the GOAL scholarships broke. Some of the degrees are not worth the paper on which they are printed. One University announced that it was never part of the programme. There is no word on where the GOAL graduates have been placed if indeed they have been able to secure jobs.

People see these things and realise that they are all window dressing. The money spent is going somewhere but not for the benefit of the people. These are the things, having been exposed, that are making Jagdeo nervous and scared of Azruddin. This is not the first time that corruption has surfaced to hurt the PPP.  This was the case during the last tenure of the PPP. It merely means corruption will always be the hallmark of the PPP. And people like Azruddin Mohamed will always be cause for concern.