ROSALINDA Rasul experienced nothing short of a mauling when she took the stand in the GECOM fraud trial last week. A person of faint heart might have folded in the cross-examination blitz that was unleashed on her, but Rasul endured the peeling with patience and composure.

Rasul is the head of the Diaspora Unit at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. Five years ago, the American Chamber of Commerce-Guyana (AMCHAM) enlisted her as an independent observer of the 2020 elections. She was assigned to monitor the vote count for Regions Three and Four which gave her a front-row seat at the Ashmin’s building in Georgetown.

What Rasul saw and heard are important details in the trial. Nine individuals are facing 19 serious charges ranging from fraud and felony to a conspiracy to undermine the will of the people of Guyana by manipulating the results of the elections.

The two defence attorneys – Nigel Hughes and Eusi Anderson – pulled out the stops in an effort to eviscerate Rasul’s credibility. In the tight quarters of Magistrate Faith McGusty’s courtroom, hidden from public scrutiny, Hughes’ insufferable personality was impossible to mask. Anderson’s patronising and clamourous behaviour became so nauseating and cringe-worthy that I opted to monitor the trial online.

Standing for hours on a tiny raised platform under an AC unit and boxed in by plexiglass, Rasul was questioned about her CV, her job at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, her salary and the stipends she received from the boards, departments and commissions that she served on. Hughes and Anderson suggested that Rasul was an agent of the PPP/C who rewarded her for “a job well done,” a slap in the face of a qualified and talented Guyanese woman.

At one point, Anderson believed he had a gotcha moment. He asked Rasul whether she knew Dhanraj Singh, a senior member of the AMCHAM team in 2020. Rasul said yes. And do you know Dhanraj Singh who has a senior job at the Transport and Harbours Department? Rasul is the chairperson of the board of advisers that oversees the department. She said yes. Back and forth it went between Anderson and Rasul as if it were an Abbott and Costello comedy skit.

It took Anderson 15 minutes to come to the realisation that two people can have identical names — one who collaborated with Rasul as an AMCHAM observer and another Dhanraj who works under Rasul at Transport and Harbours.

Having scored zero points on the Dhanraj blunder, the two defence attorneys pressed on, looking for ways to pierce Rasul’s armour. Hughes suggested that Rasul’s refusal to vacate the Ashmin’s building after a bomb threat was called in on March 5, 2020, reflects her defiance of authority. If allowed, Rasul could have retorted that the GECOM official who had called in the false threat — Roxanne Myers — had herself refused to vacate the building.

When Rasul refused to give Hughes the ‘yes’ and ‘no’ answers he was demanding of her, he pouted and threw a tantrum, folding his arm and bracing against a railing that divided the courtroom. Like a petulant child, Hughes pleaded with Magistrate McGusty for relief.

As Monday rolled into Tuesday, Hughes and Anderson started to lose their cool with Rasul. They took cheap jabs at her and even let slip several insults. In the dying minutes of Hughes’ cross-examination, he called Rasul a liar, twice. It was tactless, lacking merit and shockingly, Magistrate McGusty let it slide.

Having had nearly five years to prepare their defence and in an effort to mask their torpidity, Hughes and Anderson continued to blame prosecutors for withholding information. It only dawned on them last week that they would need a transcript of Rasul’s testimony to the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) which concluded two years ago.

The most incredulous hours of their cross-examination focused on what occurred in the tabulation room at the Ashmin’s Building between the hours of 9 PM on March 4 and 1 AM on March 5. The defence attorneys’ questions were hyper-detailed. Rasul was asked to identify the individuals in the room. She was asked to stipulate where they were standing or sitting. Did she have a pen and pencil? How many others had pens and pencils? Were there any senior GECOM officials in the room? How about APNU+AFC members? Was there anything preventing her from gaining access to the SoPs in the room?

Given his aggressive tone, some reporters expected Hughes to pull a cat out of his hat and introduce new evidence showing Rasul at the tabulation table, absent GECOM officials scribbling away on SoPs.

It was a dog and pony show; a performance. They wanted to fuel a bare-faced lie by suggesting that it was not their clients who stood accused of doctoring the numbers, but rather senior members of the PPP/C and Rasul were left unsupervised in a room with unencumbered access to the SoPs.

Neither Anderson nor Hughes asked Rasul whether she tampered with the SoPs. They weren’t interested. In this particular instant, Hughes wasn’t defending his clients, he was campaigning as the leader for the Alliance For Change. And in doing so, Hughes was counting on reporters to help his campaign.

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.