…clerk says it is serious breach of security

THERE was high drama in the National Assembly on Friday when a woman dressed as Santa Claus barged into the Parliament Chamber with a gift for the Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo as he stood up to speak.

The Clerk of the National Assembly Sherlock Isaacs has since deemed the invasion a serious security breach. For most persons in Parliament, the invasion came as a major surprise. It was just after 11:00hrs when the majority of Members Parliament from the governing side of the House were making their way out of the Parliament Chamber as Jagdeo stood to the floor to make his contribution to the 2018 National Budget debate.

Minutes into his speech, a loud bell was heard being rung. Santa Claus was standing in the chamber ringing her bell in one hand, and holding a huge Oxford Dictionary and a bar of blue soap in the other.

The assistant sergeant-at-arms with assistance from another official stopped Santa in her tracks, and escorted her out of the chamber.
It is suspected that the dictionary was intended to aid the opposition leader in spelling the word “divide”, which he had spelt incorrectly while protesting President David Granger in Parliament recently. Jagdeo had spelt the word ‘devide.’

The Clerk of the National Assembly later told reporters that the matter is being investigated, but based on a preliminary investigation, the individual entered the Parliament Buildings dressed as a normal person. “Apparently, the person came in properly dressed and changed his or her clothes in the MPs washroom, so the person didn’t come through the gate dressed in Santa’s uniform, all of that was done inside of the Public Buildings,” Isaacs explained.

After the fake Santa was escorted out of the chamber and led down the main stairs of the Public Buildings, she was allegedly snatched from the hands of the internal police present by another unknown individual. They exited through the back gate.

“What I was told by the police at the Public Buildings is that a stranger snatched the person and whisked him or her away quickly out of the compound; the person was escorted quickly out of the compound by another stranger,” the clerk explained. Isaacs later said that the internal security personnel was of the belief that the second individual was a police officer. He noted however that it is not protocol for strangers to use the back gate.
With no surveillance cameras in place at the Public Buildings, it can be difficult to put a face to the Santa Claus who complemented her outfit with a pair of shades.

Isaacs told reporters that the matter is a serious breach and the Speaker Dr. Barton Scotland has been asked to intervene. “This never happened and I feel it is a serious breach of security and I am encouraging Mr. Speaker to have a meeting of the Parliamentary Management Committee shortly to discuss the matter,” the clerk noted.

Prime Minister and Leader of Government Business Moses Nagamootoo condemned the invasion, saying that it should never have happened. People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Member of Parliament Clement Rohee also in a statement published on his Facebook page, said the opposition has written the Clerk of the National Assembly on the matter, claiming that it was an attempted assault on the opposition leader.

“The assailant entered the chamber from the section of the parliament reserved only for government ministers,” the PPP MP pointed out, while further questioning, “how the assailant bypassed the elaborate security arrangements including TSU guards and the scanners on the ground floor of the parliament building.” For him, it is “highly suspicious and questionable.”

Like the clerk, the opposition has formally requested that an urgent meeting of the Parliamentary Management Committee be convened and an investigation be launched into the breach of the security arrangements at Parliament and the attempted physical assault on Jagdeo.

“What is also strange about the incident is that while the would-be assailant was handed over to police ranks usually stationed at Parliament she was allowed to go scot-free without questioning and establishing her identity before releasing her,” Rohee said.