Level of corruption is being exaggerated

– President urges opposition to use debates to raise allegations

President Donald Ramotar on Friday lashed out at opposition political parties for misleading the country and the international community as it relates to the level of corruption in Guyana. The president stated that the “level of corruption” is being exaggerated and taken out of context.
Ramotar said corruption practices are nowhere close to the level these political parties say they are. He urged the parties to desist from painting such an image of the country and officials working under his administration.
The president made this statement during a special press conference to brief the media on several new developments in the country. “I am not denying that we have corruption in society… the extent of the corruption that is being spoken about, a lot of it is being exaggerated,” he said.
The president noted that the seven-part corruption debate series hosted on the National Communications Network (NCN) created an opportunity for members of the opposition to come forward with facts to collaborate the allegations they have made against government, as it relates to corrupt practices. He highlighted the fact that the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) only turned up once for the debate.
“This, in my mind, is a tacit acknowledgement that a lot of what they have been saying, they themselves don’t believe in, because they had an opportunity to go and confront government officials, but obviously they themselves know that it is probably best for them to stay on the sideline and cast aspersions, instead of actually confronting it. I haven’t heard all the debates but from those that I have seen, I haven’t heard any accusation of corruption, there is a lot of other things they spoke about, not corruption,” he opined.
President Ramotar said he plans to continue the debates, but they will not focus on politics and will be open to the press and civil society. This will allow people to pose many questions to major decision makers within the government, with the aim of creating a corruption-free society.
Ramotar, expanding on the recent debates, said, “You had people like Winston Brassington – he has been pilloried in the press, but he was there to answer any question and no one could really point to him with anything that was concrete… You had Mr Christopher Ram also and Mr Sharma responding to him with facts… I am not talking about the ministers who have a political agenda, but I am talking about even the technicians who were able to answer every single question that was posed to them.”
Ramotar said he hopes that this issue comes to an end, noting that his government is ready to weed out any corrupt practices and is open up to working with all parties, to ensure that “corruption” in society is reduced.
In addressing concerns about the Integrity Commission, the president said while there have been calls to strengthen the commission; he strongly believes that there is a need for more compliance.
“I think there are issues with some people who are not fully compliant with this; for example, members of the opposition side of Parliament are not cooperating with the Integrity Commission.”
This issue, he stated, will be included in the agenda when talks between government and the opposition resume. He believes that this will put an end to the concerns raised by parties about the commission.
The ruling People’s Progressive Party (PPP/C) has also said that APNU’s attempt to hide from the public debates exposes them as intellectually incapable and impotent, and confirms that they are only comfortable with their “whisper campaigns”, away from public scrutiny where blatant lies are promulgated to slander, incite, and create ethnic insecurities and hate for the government.
The APNU described the debate hosted by NCN as an ambush by the government.