– on Hansard tampering
Speaker of the National Assembly, Ralph Ramkarran, yesterday refuted claims made by Alliance For Change (AFC) Member of Parliament, Khemraj Ramjattanthat the Parliamentary Hansard has been tampered with.
Ramkarran said that Ramjattan reported his suspicion on February 22 that at the January 11 sitting of the National Assembly, the $4B allocation that was being sought by the Minister of Housing and Water, Irfaan Ali, was not spent according to the laws of Guyana.
The Speaker noted that on that same day he requested the Clerk of the National Assembly to launch an investigation.
“I expected that the Honourable Member would have awaited the results of the investigation before making a public allegation,” he said.
An article in the Kaieteur News yesterday quoted Ramjattan as saying that the money that was being sought was already spent and as such the Housing Minister was in breach of the laws of Guyana.
Ramjattan further claimed that the Minister’s words “we are ready” recorded in the Hansard should have read  “we have spent it already.”
Ramkarran however, confirmed that he has listened to the audio recording of the proceedings of the day in question, which confirmed the Hansard record of Minister Ali’s statement that “we are ready.” This statement, the Speaker said was made with exemplary clarity.
The said recording was played in the National Assembly for the benefit of all the MPs which served to further consolidate the Speaker’s account.
Ramkarran disclosed that he has requested the Clerk to ensure that Ramjattan is provided with a copy of the audio recording and will be looking forward for appropriate comments to be made in this regard in the National Assembly.
Further, a copy of the written transcript of the Hansard as well as a copy of the Speaker’s announcement and the recording will be forwarded to the publisher of the Kaieteur News with the hope that they will make an appropriate statement on the matter.
The Speaker also said that the staff of the Parliament Office, who have shown dedication, commitment, integrity and impartiality to the entire National Assembly far beyond the call of duty since he took office, are deeply pained by the allegations.
Minister Ali, in a recent comment regarding the same issue, said that “some aspects of the opposition would question an investment affair of $4B that goes towards improvement of the housing sector. We have made clear that the $4B was part of an effort to make the 17,000 house lots available and ultimately part of that effort is the acquisition of that land that is the primary ingredient towards moving in a direction to have house lots available.” (GINA)