Heist of the telecoms, media sector…AFC looking to strike out mandatory licences for Jagdeo’s friends

- We will move to change this criminal nonsense – Ramjattan

Legislators, studying measures that will allow new operators to enter the local telecommunications

AFC’s Leader, Khemraj Ramjattan

market, have vowed to make critical changes before new proposed changes are voted on.
This is following shocking revelations over the weekend that Telecommunications Licences will be handed to four companies, three of which share close ties to former President Bharrat Jagdeo.
The three companies, Quark Communications Inc., Global Technology’s i-Net Communications and E-Networks armed with such a licence would be able to compete directly with Digicel and the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GT&T), once the laws are passed in the National Assembly and assented to by President Donald Ramotar.
More glaring is that the three companies would have been rapidly expanding their distribution network knowing that the proposed changes in the law mandates that they would be given a licence while others interested in the market would have been restricted.
Following complaints that telecoms players were kept in the dark about the proposed licences, Kaieteur News in its investigations and subsequent exposure over the past few weeks made some startling revelations.
Registration documents filed with Government found that all three companies were filled with shareholders who have known ties with Jagdeo with at least one person being directly related.
With Government unveiling an aggressive project to connect 90,000 poor families with internet, any company receiving a telecoms licence will be poised to capitalize also on the mobile phone market, an area

Dr. Ranjisinghi ‘Bobby’ Ramroop

that is jealously guarded by the current companies and worth billions of dollars.
Recently, after several months in limbo in the National Assembly amidst ongoing negotiations with both GT&T and Digicel, Government re-tabled legislations to break the former’s 20 year-old monopoly on landline and international calls.
The Opposition, however, sent the proposed changes to the law to a Special Parliamentary Select Committee saying that it wanted to study it further.
Leader of the Alliance For Change (AFC), Khemraj Ramjattan, yesterday told this publication that his party, which controls seven of the 65 seats in the National Assembly, had found it strange that Government had decided upfront who are the four companies that will be receiving licences.
“A telecoms licence is not a joke that is handed willy-nilly to anyone…We are supposed to have an open, transparent system allowing everyone to have a chance to compete.”
Ramjattan said that “to decide beforehand who you want to operate in the market is indeed strange and worrying…We can draw some conclusions from this…We will move to make some changes to change this criminal nonsense.” Ramjattan’s worry is not unfounded.
Jagdeo’s best friend, Dr. Ranjisinghi ‘Bobby’ Ramroop, is a director in Global Technology.  Quark has its operations running out of Ramroops’ property at Versailles, West Bank Demerara.
Winston Brassington, a controversial figure who spearheaded a number of large scale projects for Government including the Marriott Hotel and the troubled Amaila Falls hydro facility, is a central figure in Quark.
Quark’s main founder is Brian Yong. He is known to be a close friend of Jagdeo and was even on his party’s elections campaign as a candidate in 2011.
Vishok Persaud, a main principal in E-Networks, is also a close friend of the former President and the son of a former party stalwart, the late Pandit Reepu Daman Persaud.
Already, both E-Networks and Quark have been awarded licences for operating cable TV. The controversial approvals were made days before Jagdeo ended his Presidential term of office in 2011 when he also greenlighted the operations of several radio stations, most of them going to persons and companies with close ties to the ruling party.
Several established media houses who had applied for licences, including Kaieteur News, Stabroek News

From left: E-Network’s Vishok Persaud, Bharrat Jagdeo and Quark’s Brian Yong

and CNS 6, were overlooked in the 2011 decision by the former president.
“To place this much power under unclear circumstances in a few persons’ hands is highly dangerous, and not only to national security. We already know how much resentment this has generated in the minds of Guyanese.
“I do believe that these actions by the former President were never intended to come to light; it is only through the good works of Kaieteur News that we know now.”
According to Ramjattan, the control of the state media by Government has increasingly become a dangerous one as the Opposition is sidelined from airing their views.
“We are allowed little or no access to send our message to the people who are the real owner of the state media.”
The MP made it clear that Government nor any companies should not consider it a done deal that any licence is automatic.
“I want to make it clear that is highly irregular. It is not a done deal and is evidence of the eye-pass and totally disregard of the Guyanese people…This administration have been operating as if they are a law unto themselves,”

Winston Brassington

said Ramjattan
Earlier this year, Opposition Leader, Brigadier (ret’d) David Granger, prepared a report of almost 100 cases of bias by the state-owned Government Information Agency (GINA).
For the second consecutive year, the Opposition reduced the budget of GINA, citing unhappiness over its operations.