THESE PROPOSED CHARGES WILL BACKFIRE ON THE GOVERNMENT

The public must not be lulled into believing that because the government believes that house lots in Pradoville 2 were sold below market prices, that this constitutes an act of tortious misfeasance. The Caribbean Court of Justice was divided 3-2 on this question. There is no doubt in my mind that our local courts will equally be divided on this question. In any event it is a waste of time for the APNU+AFC administration to be pursuing this course of action. The basis of the alleged misfeasance is that the house lots sold to government Ministers were below market prices. I do not see how this is a case of personal enrichment since all house lots in Guyana are sold at a subsidized cost. This would mean that all house lot holders can be taken to court for having been given house lots at a price below their market value. But just what constitutes market values? Government house lots have always been sold below the commercial market value and below the private market value. I really do not know what is all this jazz about below market value. Every government house lot is sold below the private market value because there are three market values: the government market value which is done by the Valuation Office and the private market value which is a free market transaction. But there are wider implications for this issue also. It means much of the properties that Desmond Hoyte sold during his privatizations can be called into question as being sold below market values. There were some shocking sales of houses in prime areas during the era of Hoyte and this allegation therefore about properties being sold below market values constituting misfeasance in office will open a can of worms. This issue about charging people for misfeasance is misadvised. It has no legal limb to stand on and it will backfire legally and politically in the face of the government. Legally, any action is bound to be dismissed by the court on grounds of an abuse of process. Instead of recovering assets, the government will end up having to pay massive legal costs. The PPP leaders in turn will counter sue the PPP for malicious prosecution. The government will lose and end up having to pay millions. The government will be making reckless decision if it proceeds to institute tortious misfeasance charges. The public will see right through this issue and view it as an attempt to victimize the PPP leadership. The leaders of the PPP will end up becoming popular heroes whenever the actions are dismissed by the Courts. The former President of Guyana Bharrat Jagdeo has a cast-iron immunity. He cannot be prosecuted either civilly or criminally for offences while he was President of Guyana. Before therefore he can be charged and most likely before anyone can be charged, this immunity will have to be challenged? We are looking at a case that will run for the next ten years by which time the APNU+ AFC government would have been gone from power. This whole talk about charges is therefore a waste of time. It is also politically naÏve and plays right into the hands of the PPP. APNU+AFC are showing their fear. They are afraid of Bharrat Jagdeo. They are making him more popular than he really should be. They are popularizing him with these threats of charges. The public will see through these threats. The public will view the threats as an attempt to go after the leadership of the PPP so as to ensure that Bharrat Jagdeo cannot lead the PPP into the next election. This will make him more popular and make the PPP more popular. Bharrat Jagdeo will become a folk hero. The former President does not need to be given any attention by the government. He will be the object of his own political unpopularity if he is left alone by the government. The PPP has nowhere to go under its present leadership if left alone by the government. No one is interested in the PPP’s gutter politics. But victimize the PPP and its supporters and the PPP will be converted back to the party it was between 1964 and 1992, the party of the working class, the party that led Guyana’s fight for democracy. The PPP will become more popular. The government is therefore making a big mistake by trying to move in the direction of prosecuting the leaders of the PPP over the sale of house lots for the mudflats in Sparendaam.  That land was never prime real estate. It has become so because of the investments that were made by those allotted lands but it was never any prime real estate because it lies near the country’s sea defences. The government has to come better than these charges that it is proposing. Those are disgraceful grounds