Arnold Adams, Vilma De Silva or Nandranie Coonjah to replace Dharamlall as MP

…replacement will not assume ministerial portfolio

With Nigel Dharamlall no longer performing the duties of a Minister and a Member of Parliament (MP), the Government has to now seek two persons to fill those empty positions.
This was explained by Vice President and General Secretary of the Peoples Progressive Party (PPP), Dr Bharrat Jagdeo, on Thursday. He noted that the parliamentary replacement will be different from the person who takes up the ministerial portfolio.

He explained that Dharamlall was chosen as a Parliamentarian, having been a PPP constituency candidate from the Geographical List of Candidates for Region Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam). As such, his parliamentary replacement will have to be extracted from that very list. There are currently three other persons who are likely to take up that post: Arnold Adams, Vilma DaSilva and Nandranie Coonjah.
“The MP would have to be between one of the three,” Jagdeo outlined. But he explained that the new Parliamentarian will not take up the post of Minister of Local Government and Regional Development. This, he said, is “a matter for the President” to decide.

Asked if there is a time period within which the new Minister would be appointed, Jagdeo responded, “Not necessarily. We have Anand Persaud who is the Junior Minister in there, and he’s been acting and he’s been doing a good job.”
Meanwhile, Adams is the Prime Minister’s Representative in Region Two, DaSilva is currently the Regional Chairperson, while Coonjah previously served as Regional Vice Chairperson.

The PPP is expected to submit to the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) the name of one of these individuals to take up the seat in Parliament. But this can only be done upon Dharamlall’s official resignation being tendered to the Speaker of the National Assembly, who will then have to notify GECOM of the vacancy, after which GECOM would inform the PPP.
After being cleared of charges in relation to an allegation of rape brought against him by a 16-year-old girl, Dharamlall on Tuesday tendered his resignation as a Minister and Parliamentarian, both of which were accepted by President Dr Irfaan Ali.

Dharamlall will nevertheless continue to be a member of the PPP, and also be supportive of the Government, the Guyanese Head of State had announced.

Great asset
For his part, Jagdeo has described Dharamlall as a “good Minister” and a “great asset”.
“He’s a very efficient person. I’ve worked with him a long time, and he is committed to the task of national development…I’ve seen him work very, very hard, and I need to say that…that he’s been a great asset to the PPP in its work, and I think this whole matter has taken a toll on him and his psyche…and so, I think he needs time to recover from this,” Jagdeo said.
The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) told the Police on Tuesday that there is no legal provision to proceed with any case against Dharamlall, given that the victim has withdrawn her complaint against him. According to the DPP, the victim said her decision to withdraw the complaint was made in her best interest.
From the inception of the allegation, the institutions commenced their work: the Minister was arrested and placed on $1 million station bail as the Police investigated the matter. Dharamlall was also on administrative leave throughout the entire investigation.
Meanwhile, the Vice President has criticised the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) for its continuous politicisation of this matter. In fact, Jagdeo said that, because the APNU and its supporters were politicising the matter, “they must have put more pressure on this young lady”.
He also accused the APNU of having ‘no ounce of sympathy or empathy’ of the young lady; but rather, they were simply trying to score political points.
“They were calling for his resignation or for him to be fired. He has resigned now, but they still continue to protest…,” he expressed.
The Vice President has nevertheless highlighted that, throughout the entire matter, the Government never engaged in any political defence of Dharamlall.
“Throughout it all, we stayed faithful to the process. We did not engage in political defence of Nigel Dharamlall, we didn’t comment on the victim’s statement, we said the agencies of the State have to deal with these matters by law: the Police, Childcare, the DPP Office. We allowed that process to work,” he emphasised. (G11)