–Benn says about racist, incendiary statements made by WPA members

MINISTER of Home Affairs, Robeson Benn, on Thursday, while condemning the harmful statements made by members of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA), said that legal reviews are ongoing and the law will take its course.

The minister made those remarks on the sidelines of an event on Thursday morning. He said that executive member of the WPA, Tacuma Ogunseye, appeared to be calling out persons or units of the Disciplined Services to take divisive actions which could be harmful to the country.

Ogunseye had continued the PNC’s rhetoric of unsubstantiated claims of oppression being faced by Afro-Guyanese under the current government.

At that meeting, the WPA member went a bit further by saying that members of the Joint Services should, “turn those guns in the right direction.”

As such, Minister Benn told reporters on Thursday: “I’m condemning them in the strongest term… I’m saying while we are having legal reviews of them they appear to me to be frankly seditious and if they are found to be seditious, the laws will take its course.”

He went on to add that we cannot have persons making such insinuations and suggestions in a democratic environment, where there are systems in place like the courts, and parliament that persons can approach if they feel aggrieved.

“There is representation in the parliament and there is also the courts, the legal system and we should not allow persons to… in a crowded hall of people shout fire or call one set of people to attack another set of people,” the Home Affairs Minister remarked.

Benn went on to add that for persons to suggest that those who have arms in a formal Disciplined Service background should turn the same against the state or against their fellow Guyanese should be condemned in the strongest possible terms.