CONTRARY to media reports, parliamentary sittings under the present government have seen the highest number in the first three years of any parliament since 1992, said Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo.

He was at the time refuting recent claims by a particular media entity, which stated, “there have been very few sittings of the House for 2018,” also stating that the country possessed a “dormant Parliament.”

Presenting data from the year 1992 to current, the prime minister, in his weekly column My Turn, stated that “lies and half-truths” will bear no fruit for those trying to discredit the government.

The statistics provided show that there were 62 sittings during the 7th Parliament of former President Janet Jagan’s Presidency (1997-2001) and 88 parliamentary sittings during the Presidency of Donald Ramotar (2011-2014).

Meanwhile, in the first three years of the 11th Parliament (2015-2018), 96 sittings have already concluded with sittings expected to surpass 110 by the end of 2018.

“For those of us who believe in transforming our freedom in both political and socio-economic forms, this is like a dream becoming true. We are closer today to achieving a democratic system of governance with sustainable economic growth than ever before,” Nagamootoo stated.

Even as he highlighted that untruths regarding fewer parliamentary sittings have been aided and peddled by the opposition, he nonetheless chastised the media body for its lack of in-depth research on the matter.

“This pastime is not an academic deficit, but is either just pure laziness to research the facts, or idle pursuit of a mistaken belief in the Goebbelsian lie that, if repeated often, could be believed as the truth…like a relay in a marathon race of falsehoods, the [media house] took up the bruised baton, and ran with it,” he said.

The prime minister also addressed portions of the article, which suggested that Parliament was crippled as result of his travels overseas for non –official duties.

These, he pointed out, were for medical reasons and that when he travelled to receive medical attention six months ago, it was the first time that he had done so in over 25 years while in public office.

“The absence of the Leader of Government Business in the House did not prevent the National Assembly from meeting on August 8 last for very important national matters. After that sitting, the House went into scheduled recess for two months.

“It had become necessary for me to leave the jurisdiction for a much-delayed medical check-up, since I had triple heart by-pass surgery six months ago. I concede that ‘private business’ didn’t quite explain why I travelled overseas. But I can assure you that it was not on a folly in order to sabotage the Parliament,” he stated.

Such “a crooked spin to the truth”, Nagamootoo continued, is what he has begun to expect from the opposition, which has used several other tactics to paint a “worrying picture of the future of Guyana.”

To this, he said: “It brings to mind a statement disputably attributed to Abraham Lincoln: ‘You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

“But for Guyanese, we can remind those who peddle lies and half-truths of what the old people say: ‘Moon ah run till day ketch am!’”