CABINET, on the basis of its public acceptance of the report from the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (CoI) into the Linden disturbances, has approved the implementation of the recommendations, Head of the Presidential Secretariat (HPS), Dr. Roger Luncheon announced yesterday.

Speaking at his usual post-Cabinet media briefing, in Office of the President, Shiv Chanderpaul Drive, Georgetown, he said the recommended compensation, being implemented, would see $22M worth of ex-gratia payments made to the families of the three deceased, the injured and those who have suffered loss of property.
Such a payment is one made without the payer admitting any liability or legal obligation.
The CoI into the July 18, 2012 killings, at the Wismar/Mackenzie Bridge in Linden, concluded earlier this year.
According to Luncheon, some of the recommendations were grudgingly accepted “with a grain of salt, particularly the findings about the Police Force.”
He said that comprehensive culpability was not established and he also posited that the commissioners’ insinuation was that “we don’t have any reason to blame anyone else and, therefore, it had to be you the police.”
    
CATEGORICALLY EXONERATED
Luncheon made reference to the conclusions arrived at by the Commissioners, in relation to the Minister of Home Affairs, Mr. Clement Rohee, when they said that he had been categorically exonerated.
The HPS pointed, as well, to the recommendations made by the Commission in relation to the Guyana Police Force (GPF) and reminded that the Administration did not have to await the report to begin implementing reforms.
The June 18, 2012 protest was one of many in the mining community of Linden which stemmed from the planned increase in electricity tariffs to consumers that attracted the concerns of the political opposition and other organisations.