Embattled Permanent Secretary (PS) of the Ministry of the Presidency, Omar Shariff, has sued Television Reporter Travis Chase, for in excess of million over statements he would have made during his HGPTV Nightly News Broadcast on Monday last.
Shariff has also sued television station HGPTV and its proprietor Omar Farouk, also called “Terry Nelson Fraser”.
The legal proceedings were instituted on Thursday and Chase along with the television station owner have since been commanded to make an appearance in the High Court within 10 days.
Shariff in his writ is claiming in excess of $10 million for defamation, libel and slander, charging that Chase during his newscast on Monday last said, “Shariff liquid assets stands at just about 10 billion dollars and “credible sources have told Nightly News that Mr Shariff would not have obtained the billions of dollars overnight and they are suggesting that Mr Shariff is holding the money for someone or a particular group.”
Shariff was sent on leave last month from the Ministry of the Presidency by Minister of State Joseph Harmon, pending an investigation into substantial amounts of cash and holdings, believed to be in excess of $10 billion by the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU).
Shariff in his writ, claims the utterances made by Chase during his newscast, are not only false but malicious, slanderous and libelous.
The PS is also asking for in excess of $10 million for defamation in relation to the publication of the very newscast on social media platforms, including the Facebook page of HGPTV.
Shariff in his writ is also asking the Judge to grant an injunction, restraining Chase and the television station from further writing, printing or publishing or circulating or causing to be written, printed, published of circulated the ‘libelous statements.’
Shariff is being represented by Attorney Sanjeev Datadin.
Chase, himself no stranger to legal proceedings, was recently the subject of a request by Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) Prosecutor Kunyo Sandyford-Thompson, in relation to an ongoing drug trial involving alleged ‘drug-baron’ Barry Dataram.
The CANU Prosecutor had requested Magistrate Judy Latchman to issue a summons to have Chase appear in court to give testimony against Dataram.
Chase has since told Guyana Times that he has seen the writ and will be defending the matter vigorously in court.
According to the TV Reporter, he stands by the integrity of the news article.
The embattled Permanent Secretary last weekend broke his silence in relation to the multibillion-dollar affair, to proclaim his innocence in the insinuations that he had stole or laundered public monies for personal gain.
He had at the time also lamented that information disclosed to SOCU which was obtained through a warrant has since found its way into the public domain.
Chase during his news report had also reproduced the documents purportedly of bank accounts and their balances belonging to Shariff.
Responding the publicity of the confidential banking information that was used to generate news reports in sections of the media, Shariff said: “I wish to strongly condemn a series of vile, sensationalist, untrue, propagandistic, and, insubstantial and material respects, misleading news reports carried by sections of the electronic, broadcast and print media in Guyana following a decision by the Special Organised Crime Unit to launch an investigation into a personal matter related to tax remittance and compliance regarding my legitimate business operations over the past few years.”
He has since claimed that the matter of tax remittance and compliance has been an ongoing engagement “between my business and the tax authority from as early as 2007.”
He said the distortion of this personal income tax matter to make it appear to be theft and embezzlement of public funds is without any factual foundation and is in fact, mischief by its orchestrators.
He said the continued publication of “these have caused me and my family great concern – security, hardship and otherwise.”
