“It was a dark night in the history of Corriverton” – Mayor

Govt sabotage of Region 6 flag raising

…Town Council to brief ABC countries on ministerial interference
…says local democracy under threat

By Michael Younge

“It was a dark night in the history of Corriverton when the Police and Government attempted to undermine the will of the people and our right to local democracy. In all of our 48 years of hosting flag-raising events, this has never happened. I am not only upset, but I am concerned about the embarrassment that we faced; but the people were on our side.”
Those were the words of Corriverton Mayor Krishnand Jaichand, who strongly condemned the actions of the APNU-AFC Coalition Government and the Guyana Police Force, which saw them blocking and sabotaging the staging of the town’s

Corriverton Mayor, Krishnand Jaichand

annual flag-raising ceremony on Thursday evening into Friday morning.
Speaking with Guyana Times during an interview on Friday afternoon, Jaichand related that neither subject minister Ronald Bulkan nor the leadership of the Guyana Police Force has reached out to the Town Council to formally apologise over the fiasco, which saw the event being halted prematurely.
The mayor has insisted that his Town Council had formally invited Minister Bulkan to deliver remarks at the flag-raising event, but it had not received any response from his office even as the time drew near to confirm the programme and speakers for the event.
“After we got no response, a decision was taken by the full council to invite one Mr Adrian Anamayah to deliver greetings and remarks”, he explained. Anamayah is a resident of Region Six and a Member of Parliament for the Opposition Peoples Progressive Party.
Mayor Jaichand explained that a while after the decision was made, he received a

‘B’ Division Commander, Lyndon Alves

call from Minister Bulkan to plead with him to change the programme to allow Public Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan to be the feature speaker at the event.
“I told Minister Bulkan that I would speak with the Council, and that is what I did”, Jaichand related as he explained further that while the Council accepted Bulkan’s proposal, it rejected the notion of Ramjattan delivering feature remarks and speaking last. It agreed that he should be the penultimate speaker at the flag-raising ceremony, and Anamayah, who was already invited formally, would remain as the last person to address the audience.
Infuriated Govt
This infuriated the Government, and saw Social Protection Minister Amna Ally, a senior functionary in the Coalition Government and General Secretary of the People’s National Congress, contacting the Mayor and insisting that Ramjattan be the feature speaker.
“I told Minister Ally that I would speak to the Council. I did, and they held on to their original positions. By the time I called her back within 20 minutes, Minister Ally told

Minister Amna Ally

me that she has already called the Commander and instructed that the event must not take place,” Jaichand reported.
Asked if he was sure that those were the minister’s exact words and whether he was prepared to stand by what he said had transpired despite the consequences which may lie ahead, the mayor responded in the affirmative.
He related that all plans went ahead, and some 100 persons or more, including children and adults from Corriverton, were scheduled to be part of the cultural programme.
“We got a call from the Springlands Police Station which informed us that we should not go ahead with the event, as no permission had been granted. They said they were acting on instructions from higher up,” the mayor related.
He said a senior police inspector arrived on the scene along with ranks and commenced a campaign to ensure that the event was not staged. He said the

Minister Khemraj Ramjattan

Police present also made some allowances and they were able eventually to say a prayer and hoist the flag, as was planned; but no music or speeches were allowed.
“The whole thing turned out to be an embarrassment, even though we accommodated the minister. I think the subject Minister of Communities should have been the one to get more involved if they felt they needed to, and not Minister Ally. At the end of the day, local democracy and local Government organs are under attack,” he posited.
ABC briefings
He vowed that the Corriverton Town Council would be informing members of the diplomatic corps, especially the ABC countries, about the unfortunate developments which occurred on the “dark night of February 22 and the morning of February 23.
“Could you imagine that a minister gave direct operational instructions to the ‘B’ Division Commander?” the mayor asked in a puzzled tone. He said an emergency meeting of the full council would be held shortly, wherein it is likely that a motion condemning the ministerial interference and the Police excess would be passed. Mayor Jaichand said the residents of Corriverton are fully supportive of the Council, and before the Police got involved, there were hundreds gathering; but the crowd started to whiter after the situation continued. He argued that it was a classic case of political interference, but he could not immediately list the other remedies available to the Council in sending a clear message that it would not allow its authority to be undermined, or itself be cowed by the ministerial pool.