Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, has once again restated the PPP/C Government’s commitment to launch a forensic review into the events that unfolded after the March 2 General and Regional Elections and holding persons accountable for attempting to subvert democracy in Guyana.
“The GECOM matter will be tackled frontally,” Nandlall declared during a recent interview programme Room 592 hosted by Yog Mahadeo.
“I will renew our pledge to leave no stone unturned as we get to the bottom of it, but we are going to do it the legal and professional way”.
The Attorney General reminded that President Ali made this commitment and publicly committed his government to that process during his inauguration speech on August 2.
In response to public anxiety as to when the process would commence he said: “We were the victims of the fraud, and just like the public we want to know what went on”.
While acknowledging that the attempts to derail the electoral process did not succeed, Nandlall posited that the entire country would like to know “who were behind the attempts, the intellectual authors and the actual executioners, and we want to know what motivated (them).”
Nandlall argued that there are several components of the electoral process which must be addressed to prevent a recurrence of what happened post March 2.
“Not one type of law was violated, fraud was committed, the criminal laws were violated,” he posited.
According to Nandlall, Guyana will have elections again in five years, and the country must now be allowed go to elections again “using the same institutional weaknesses”.
“This is about cleansing the system; it’s about deterring the reoccurrence of what transpired.” he asserted.
According to the AG, the government is hoping for a review of the systems from many perspectives and expressed hope that at the end of the day, the public will be satisfied that “we did a great deal in our attempts to improving the system, while at the same bringing to justice those who may have committed an offence”.
President Ali, during his maiden address as Head of State at his inauguration ceremony had said that his Government has an obligation to the nation and to themselves to ensure that no other generation of Guyanese is subjected to such unlawful behaviour that has transpired, for five months, when the country was embroiled in a political and electoral impasse.
“All of us are painfully aware of the trauma and anguish that our people endured over the past five months as vigorous attempts were made to destroy our democratic credentials, and deny the will of the electorate… Therefore, a review of events – related to the electoral process over the last five months – will begin shortly in order to determine, forensically, exactly what transpired, and to hold accountable any persons who sought to pervert and corrupt the system,” the Head of State had announced.
Nandlall had subsequently explained that there are several options available to the PPP/C Administration to pursue the forensic review – a Commission of Inquiry (CoI), a forensic and/or a “deep probing police” investigation.
Meanwhile, in relation to the elections petition that the APNU/AFC had promised to file in the High Court to challenge the elections outcome, Nandlall asserted that the PPP/C Government is eagerly awaiting the process which he said would turn out to be “a good theatre”.
