Date: February 29, 2012
For Immediate Release to all Media Houses
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France Ambassador to Caricom meets AFC - Read by Moses Nagamootoo
France’s Ambassador to Caricom H.E Joel Godeau met with Alliance For Change Member of Parliament Moses Nagamootoo on Monday, February 27, 2012 in Georgetown.
Talks centred on Guyana-France-EU relations and the need to deepen cooperation among these states.
The French Ambassador who is based in Cayenne, French Guiana said, he paid great interest in the outcome of the Guyana 2011 Elections.
Nagamootoo in return informed the French Ambassador of the AFC’s campaign for clean and accountable governance and the Party’s commitment to fight all forms of corruption.
Nagamootoo also took the opportunity to express AFC’s commitment to national unity and cooperation through dialogue. He assured Ambassador Godeau that the AFC will examine the need for a Guyana consulate in Cayenne and support France's interest in an observer role within Caricom taking into consideration the importance of France's -Caribbean departments and states.
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AFC will not be lenient with corrupt officials - Read by Khemraj Ramjattan
The Alliance For Change is urging its colleagues in the Parliament to see the Tenth Parliament as an opportunity to advance good governance and stamp out corruption. This comes as the Party reviews the latest Auditor General’s Report and compares it with previous Reports.
In its analysis of the AG’s Report, the AFC notes that once again the Auditor General has identified a gamut of financial discrepancies and instances of non-accountability that contravene financial management practices. This has been the case of many Reports before. Yet, even though these infractions continue to be identified many government ministries and agencies fail to take corrective measures. It seems that these ministries and agencies have no regard for the Auditor General’s recommendations and are determined, year after year, to continue with their bad practices. This is an insult to the work of the Auditor General’s Office and contemptuous of taxpayers, whose money it is, that is not being properly accounted for. This state of affairs must not continue.
The AFC has already indicated its zero tolerance on corruption and now reiterates its position. Let this be a message to those corrupt officials who continue to engage in shady transactions and who fail to enact proper accounting measures, the AFC will not be lenient with you.
The people of this country are expecting their leaders in the Parliament to tackle corruption head-on by providing iron-clad legislation and using its power to call officials to account and more! The National Assembly and more so the Public Accounts Committee of the Assembly have critical roles to play in ensuring taxpayers money is not siphoned off into deep pockets.
The people, through their vote, have given the Assembly the strength it needs to fight financial corruption and the Tenth Parliament would be failing in its duty to the people if it allows the discrepancies identified by the Auditor General to go uncorrected.
The Alliance For Change sees it as the Party’s solemn duty to the people to act against corrupt officials. This is the duty also of all the members of the National Assembly. If new conventions have to be written and new precedents set, then so be it. The people voted for a new dispensation, one that gives them confidence in the system. The people are the masters, MPs the servants. As servants of the people we must deliver what our masters have mandated us to do.
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AFC endorses OAS Observer Mission Report - Read by Khemraj Ramjattan
The Alliance For Change (AFC) thanks the OAS Electoral Observer Mission to the Guyana General and Regional Elections 2011, for its verbal Report. The Report is concise, factual, debunks any claim of rigging by the opposition and more importantly, provides a number of recommendations for improving the conduct of elections in Guyana.
The AFC notes, that in the Report, the OAS Observer Mission made a point of addressing a number of issues which the AFC has been speaking about for sometime now, including; campaign financing, the use of state resources for electoral purposes and the unequal conditions for electoral competition; the need to include enforcement mechanisms in the Code of Conduct for Political Parties; government monopoly of radio, and; access to the state owned television station.
Of particular concern to the AFC, is the OAS Mission report that, “in the tabulation and processing of the polls several incidents (were observed) which demonstrated the lack of application of uniform procedures, including:
- The OAS teams stationed at the tabulation center in Georgetown observed at least two envelopes containing statements of poll being delivered by an unaccredited and unescorted individual.
- On at least two occasions, statements of poll bypassed the system whereby the Commissioners examined them and were instead delivered directly to the manual tabulation process.
- On November 29th, for about half an hour the reception procedure was reversed by the GECOM Chairman to institute the direct delivery of statements of poll to the manual tabulation process, prior to their verification by Commissioners.
- Prior to the declaration of results, the IT department was unable to finish processing all of the statements of poll, and 307 were not in the digital tabulation center’s system half an hour before the originally scheduled declaration of results. While the declaration of results is legally based on the information provided to the Chief Electoral Officer by the Returning Officers, corroborating the manual tally with that of the IT department prior to the declaration of results could have helped lend credibility to the process.”
These observations of the OAS Mission are a clear indication that GECOM must undergo reform if the people of Guyana are to have any confidence in the system.
The Report clearly points to the need to reform GECOM prior to the holding of Local Government Elections and it must therefore be treated with top-most priority. The AFC has made this point at the level of the tripartite talks with the government and APNU.
The AFC fully endorses the recommendations of the OAS Observation Mission and to this end the Party will bring to the National Assembly a Motion calling for the reform of GECOM. In light of the OAS Report, the AFC anticipates that it will get the full support of the House.
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Border residents feel closer to Brazil - Read by Mark Crawford, AFC Region 8 Chairman
The Alliance For Change is calling on the Government and more so the Minister of Amerindian Affairs to look into the concerns of Amerindian residents at the border villages. The AFC has been informed through our Regional representatives that, due to neglect over many years, our Amerindian brothers and sisters are forced to look to foreign governments for assistance.
While this is not dissimilar to what is happening on the coastal belt, the AFC understands that the residents of these villages are forced to access even the most basic of services from neighbouring Brazil, because the Guyana Government failed to provide for the residents. As a result, many of the residents now carry Brazilian Identification cards.
Dr. Cheddi Jagan, the father of the PPP often said, “Guyana is too rich to be so poor.” Yet, after more than twenty years of PPP government, our first people are forced to look to a neighbouring government for food, clothing, kitchen utensils, hammocks and farming tools.
It is time for the government to abandon idle rhetoric and public posturing and get down to really addressing the welfare of hinterland residents.
The AFC anticipates that the 2012 National Budget will make provisions to alleviate the suffering of the Amerindian peoples. The Party will pay close scrutiny to all allocations for Amerindian development to ensure that it is spent on the areas for which it was voted and to ensure that there is value for money in the execution of projects within these areas.
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Sam & Roger examine eee good...both side.
