THE 30th sitting of the National Assembly was last Thursday adjourned

until November 22 as a consequence of the disorderly conduct of members of the combined opposition towards Minister of Home Affairs, Clement Rohee.
The ruckus created by the opposition brought the parliamentary sitting to a near state of anarchy which the Speaker, Mr. Raphael Trotman seemingly tolerated.
The lawless display by the opposition was similar to the one at the previous sitting of the National Assembly, which also resulted in the adjourning of the House.
Since the convening of the 9th Parliament, subsequent to general elections of November 2011, there have been constant confrontational altercations between government and the joint opposition, which together have a one-seat majority, won with six votes.
Without a doubt, as the evolving incidents have proven, the joint opposition has entered into an opposition of solidarity, with the primary focus on removing the PPP/C Government by using former President Hoyte’s strategy of making the country ungovernable.
Thus, through one stratagem or another- zeroing in on one public official or another- ably backed by the opposition media houses and their satellites in the socio-political construct, namely Christopher Ram and others of his ilk, the Guyana Human Rights Association, the factions of the Catholic Church associated with the WPA, now in a coalition with APNU, WPA/APNU’s women’s arm – Red Thread, et al, the joint opposition has been using intra and extra-parliamentary tactics to derail the functions of government; thus stymieing socio-economic development in the country.
If the supporters of the AFC/APNU/PNC have not seen through the dangerous games the joint opposition is playing with their lives and the future of their children by now, then it is hardly likely that they will ever do so; and the consequences to this entire nation will be dire if the shenanigans of the AFC/PNC/APNU are not brought to a halt with immediacy.
Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee is merely a pawn in their diabolical game; and if the government buckles to their blackmail over this issue, then heaven help Guyana, because what is really needed now is a government with backbone.
What has enraged the opposition is that all their diabolical schemes are backfiring on them. Also, both political entities are playing both sides against the middle – as when the AFC ran to Linden to tell PNC supporters that APNU had sold them out when that party had agreed to the government’s menu of measures to bring the electricity tariff in the mining town in line with the national electricity tariffs; then it was apparent that, while the AFC meant to stir up trouble in Linden so that what they planned to play out actually did, with the violence intended to spread across the country in what they call, and Freddie Kissoon always write about – an ‘Arab Spring’, they had no idea that an affiliate would orchestrate the killing of a few protesters – collateral damage, so as to rile up the populace against the government and the law enforcement bodies and engender total anarchy in the country.
The AFC actually thought that the police had played into their hands and incidentally backed their end-game by the shooting of the Linden protesters, so they, along with APNU/PNC demanded a Commission of Inquiry (CoI); moreover, one comprising foreigners, the names drawn from a list submitted by CARICOM; and all the parties consensually agreed to the composition of the CoI and the Terms of Reference for its mandate.
Subsequently, they began making a series of objections to a CoI and Terms of Reference to which they had equally agreed; then, when their witnesses, including opposition MPs were proving to be liars, as was the AFC Chairman Nigel Hughes, who said in no uncertain terms that he had access to telephone records that could prove Rohee had given orders for the police to shoot at the Linden protesters.
It turned out that neither had the police shot at the protesters, which was attested to by the AFC’s own ballistics expert, nor did Rohee give any orders to police prior to the shooting. Hughes and the opposition were belittled time and again as the facts emerged – one by one.
Then, in the midst of the fact-finding enquiry, the APNU/PNC/AFC configuration once again stirred up trouble – this time by choking the East Bank artery at Agricola, the unfolding events of which are much chronicled and established, hoping for the same end results. Having emasculated the police with their accusations of using excessive force in Linden, the goons and criminals had a field day robbing, sexually assaulting, and beating commuters and pedestrians caught up in the fray, as well as setting afire vehicles of private citizens, while caught on camera assaulting the highly ineffective police, who stood by helplessly while men, women, and even children were beaten, robbed and assaulted in various ways, at times in full view of the joint services.
In previous years opposition supporters in Buxton had also suffered, almost as much as their victims, and this time around they refused to become pawns of the opposition’s evil games, having experienced the progress they had made in the intervening years when they co-operated with the government in developmental instead of destructive initiatives: Again, during the Linden and Agricola well-planned-well-executed incidents, even opposition supporters and their children had suffered, right along their intended target victims.
As in Linden, the blame-game surfaced, with the joint opposition members who had continually riled up the people in Agricola, especially Nigel Hughes and Nagamootoo, who had given the gov’t 48 hours to sack Minister Rohee or face the consequences. One Vishnu Bisram wrote that his good friend Moses Nagamootoo would never plan a campaign of destabilisation where Indians would be attacked, which was disingenuous of him, at the least, because Nagamootoo came out of the bowels of politics in Guyana and knows fully well, with absolute consciousness, what would play out after their inflammatory rhetoric both at Linden and Agricola. Actually, Ramjattan and Nagamootoo, when they had tried to inflame the senses of the Lindeners, had accused the government of favouring GuySuCo workers over Lindeners, with the racist connotations, in their opportunistic attempt to win the support of the traditional PNC enclave.
Instead of addressing the work they are mandated to do in the interest of the people of the country, they swore to serve via Parliament, the joint opposition, while drawing fat salaries, accessing tax-free vehicles, and enjoying various benefits, including lavish meals during parliamentary sittings, are pursuing their own self-aggrandizement, self-empowerment agendas by stymieing government’s developmental initiatives; and one year after they are yet to sit down to the nation’s real business as per their parliamentary mandate.
The Rohee issue is another red-herring, what former President Jagdeo referred to as “The Corbin Syndrome”, which is an opposition strategy for blaming others for their faults and crimes against the nation.
Trotman had declared, prior to Rohee rising to speak, that the minister should be allowed to proceed uninterrupted. He noted that this decision was made on the basis of legal advice he received from Attorneys-at-Law, Rex McKay and Stephen Fraser, and also Ms. Ulele Burnham of the United Kingdom Bar Association.
Trotman explained that he had to resort to seeking legal advice because on the first occasion when the bill was introduced in Parliament, the House went in an uproar regarding the ability of Rohee to perform the duties of Minister of Home Affairs, and some opposition members believed that he should not be allowed to speak.
Nevertheless, Trotman stated that he must find that, in the absence of a specific resolution in the House that specifically sanctions a member and directs that he be restrained from speaking in any one or more of his capacities, it is by law and duty bound that the minister must be allowed to speak.
“The Speaker of the National Assembly of Guyana, I so rule, has no power to restrict or deny the right of the Honourable Clement J. Rohee, Member of Parliament, from speaking or fulfilling his ministerial duties and responsibilities, insofar as they relate to this house of assembly,” he stated.
Subsequently the Attorney-General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall said inter alia: “Again the government and I have been vindicated. From the time the no-confidence motion (against Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee) was brought I emphatically asserted that it was misconceived, wrong and impotent. I explained that the President has appointed Minister Rohee under the Constitution of Guyana to act as Minister of Home Affairs.  Minister Rohee was elected under the constitution of Guyana as a Member of the National Assembly, therefore he does not function as a minister, nor does he sit in the National Assembly by virtue of the confidence, or lack thereof, of the National Assembly.
All of my arguments were ignored by the National Assembly.  Now the Speaker has solicited two opinions from eminent senior Counsel Mr. Rex McKay, and (Attorney-at-Law) Stephen Fraser, and both opinioned… are identical to what I articulated in the National Assembly and elsewhere. Incidentally, Mr. Rex McKay SC, is the lawyer for APNU, yet on Thursday in the Parliament, when the Speaker read these opinions and ruled that based upon these opinions Rohee cannot be prevented from discharging his functions, neither as Minister of Home Affairs nor as a Member of Parliament, the joint opposition in defiance of the Speaker’s ruling continued to prevent Rohee from discharging his function in the National Assembly.
Under our present system, the Speaker’s ruling is final and conclusive on any given matter; so the joint opposition have disregarded their own lawyer’s advice and have defied the Speaker’s ruling, again confirming what I have been saying for the last eleven months, that this National Assembly intends to derail all lawful processes and undermine all the democratic institutions of the country. Indeed, they are behaving like a truly unruly horse.
And while the recalcitrant opposition continues with its grand-standing, much time is wasted by public officials, as well as taxpayers’ money and national resources.  It is believed that these actions are orchestrated so that their friends can draw down millions of dollars on one pretext or another, because it is wondered why, with so many lawyers, who are framers of the Constitution, sitting on both sides of the House, there was need for legal advice from outside sources – all of it from opposition members and/or supporters.
As is also the case where granger has eschewed well-appointed chambers in Parliament Building to rent office space from AFC chairman Nigel Hughes at the sum in excess of $12 million dollars per year in rental fees alone, not counting all the luxurious appointments; as well as state-paid driver, guards – both at his office and his residence, and a multiplicity of other benefits.
If they could be doing these things while out of office, imagine what they would do if they ever attain the highest executive office in the land; and it is toward this end that, as the AG said, they are behaving like “a truly unruly horse.”