– As threats issued to relinquish jobs
– Coalition government assures of job security

THE current political atmosphere has been causing and raising tension in the country as everyone awaits the final outcome of the national recount. Although no winner has as yet been declared or even hinted by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), which is the official, legal body governing the process, the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) has presumed victory and has been bombarding their way into governing the people of this country.

On Wednesday evening, a video started circulating on social media of the PPP/C’s Bishop Juan Edghill, threatening the jobs of current public servants and persons who were granted contracts to perform duties on behalf of the government, wishing sleepless nights on them.
His sentiments were aired via a Facebook live programme, hosted by his own political party. On the programme Edghill said that anything that was awarded after the no-confidence motion that was passed since December 21, 2018, and more particularly after Parliament was dissolved and the country was in elections mode, “and more so after March 2 when you had an election and people are still getting lands awarded to them, and contracts awarded and now people are being employed by way of employment contracts, which is putting us in a very difficult position. All of those persons need to be put on notice because that’s not the way a government operates; that’s not the way democracies operate.”

He went on to ventilate that he saw the news of a newly appointed vice-chancellor at the University of Guyana, deeming that action illegal and threatening to have all that removed.
“In this context of an administration being voted out and a new administration coming in, permanent secretaries, heads of budget agencies, people who are appointed as a result of the Fiscal Management and Accountability Act (FMAA), need to take notice that you have to act in a certain way because you are awaiting a new political directorate who will set new priorities, who will have a specific agenda, and will give new policy direction. And to act contrary to that, will have serious consequences, and that’s the reality. Whoever are involved in that and whoever are beneficiaries of such skulduggery, you gonna have sleepless nights starting tonight, because you are hearing from the PPP/C by way of this programme. Don’t believe that you are going to walk away and smile and say you have a legal contract. You know fully well you should not have been going in that direction and you will have to face the consequence,” Edghill said.

In this regard, A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) members have been doing damage control and repairing the damage that these threats would have evoked on innocent people of the country.

Via a digital press conference, APNU+AFC executive member Joseph Harmon, assured of job security.

“The statements by Juan Edghill reflect the real PPP/C and their true position. And these statements made by him, have a tendency to, and has created anxiety among hard working public servants whose loyalty is not to a political party, but to the government of the day. That is the contract in which they signed. But Edghill who seems to be the voice of PPP/C to address certain ethnic issues, is adding fuel to an already charged political environment. Bharrat Jagdeo and Irfaan Ali and the leadership of the party must recognise that Edghill is doing them a disservice. If this is his way of making known his displeasure of being bypassed [for] the position of prime ministerial candidate in the PPP, Edghill must choose some other pulpit to vent his frustration,” Harmon said.

Further expressing his assertion that “the APNU+AFC coalition wishes to give all public servants the assurance that they will be fully protected and Edghill’s threat will remain but an empty promise by an angry man.”

In fact, citing a strand of history from the last elections in Guyana, APNU’s, Jaipaul Sharman expressed on his Facebook page that the stance of Edghill is quite hypocritical.
“A few months prior to the May 11th, 2015 General and Regional Elections in Guyana, the PPP/C government gave their party political elites a GOLDEN HANDSHAKE which caused the APNU+AFC GOVERNMENT much delay in executing their planned activities. Also, it was very costly to remove the PPP/C elite from the APNU+AFC GOVERNMENT. Lo and behold, today Bishop Juan Edghill was on the air threatening persons that had their contracts renewed under the APNU+AFC Government, saying that their services will be terminated without compensation. In addition, he threatened that people [who] received lands that it would be taken back, but again Bishop Juan Edghill forget [sic] to mention that in 2015 the PPP/C ‘s presidential candidate transferred lands to housing developers one day after the May 11th, 2015 General and Regional Elections in Guyana. It is clear as day that Bishop Juan Edghill deliberately failed to mention that the PPP/C was guilty of what he was accusing the APNU+AFC of doing,” Sharma’s post outlined.

Citing further a case in point, when the APNU+AFC government was ordered by the court in October 2018 to pay Harry Narine Nawbatt, the former Guyana High Commissioner to Canada some $25 million in court costs for unfair dismissal. Nawbatt’s appointment to that post commenced under the then People’s Progressive Party/Civic government on February 9, 2015, three months before the May 2015 General and Regional Elections.

Minister Simona Broomes in her personal capacity, by way of a Facebook interview with Kester Deane, spoke briefly about the threats.

She said that with her interactions with youths in the streets she has sensed fear.
Broomes said that the current demeanour of the PPP/C, purporting this victory narrative through ‘bullyism’, is bringing a spirit of fear on the young people of the country, who are gravely concerned about their future and the future of Guyana.

The coalition, she said, has been working to ensure that a sense of calmness remains among the people of Guyana, especially the youths, as the results are being deliberated upon.