A Partnership for National Unit (APNU) has registered its concern over being told that the Office of the President (OP) has control over the Square of the Revolution, which had led to a delay in the granting of permission to use a noisy instrument at Friday’s rally. This information was relayed by Divisional Commander Clifton Hicken in response to the party’s request for permission to use the noisy instrument.
When contacted shortly after APNU dispatched a copy of Hicken’s letter and a press release on the issue, the commander explained to Stabroek News that though the Square of the Revolution is a public place it “comes under the control of OP.” He indicated that the issue had since been sorted out as APNU was given the greenlight to conduct the rally and to use the noisy instrument as requested.
Attorney Basil Williams wrote a letter in reply to Hicken on behalf of Oscar Clarke, General Secretary of the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR). The PNCR is part of APNU. Williams’s letter, dated November 13, said “I note that you have made the receipt of an approval letter from the Office of the President to use the Square of the Revolution for a public meeting, a condition precedent to obtaining your approval of a permit… to use a noisy instrument at the said meeting.”
The attorney informed that the commander’s authorisation to issue approval for the said “permit” derives from Section 12(2) of the Public Order Act Chapter 16:03 Laws of Guyana which provides:-
“Subject to any regulations made under this Act, the Chief Officer of Police may in his discretion grant permission in writing to any person to use a noisy instrument for the purpose of any public meeting… upon such terms and conditions and subject to such restrictions as he by such permission determines. It is apposite that your discretion under the said section must be exercised judiciously and not whimsically or capriciously.”
Williams’s letter stated that in section 2 of the said Act, a “public meeting” includes any meeting in a public place and any meeting which the public or any section thereof are permitted to attend, whether on payment or otherwise. The section goes further to define it as any highway, public park or garden, road, street, land, footway, square and includes any open space to which for the time being, the public have or are permitted to have access, whether on payment or otherwise.
The attorney submitted that in light of what he had outlined the Square of the Revolution is a public place.
“It follows inexorably that further permission from the Office of the President is superfluous, and amounts to an unlawful surrendering of the power given you in the said section 12(2), to the Office of the President,” he said. He submitted that the purported imposition of the said condition precedent is “arbitrary, unreasonable, ultra vires, null and void and in breach of my client’s constitutional right of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.
“In conclusion, I am sure that you can consider that in the circumstances there is no impediment to you exercising your discretion in favour of granting the permit to use a ‘noisy instrument’ at the public meeting…,” the letter read.
Contacted yesterday former police commissioner Winston Felix said that this the same sort of information that was relayed to him.
He said that in addition to the position that OP has control, a senior police official subsequently told him that the Square of the Revolution falls under the control of the National Trust. Felix who is now an APNU MP said that while he had previously heard about OP having control of that area this is the first time he is hearing about the National Trust. He said he did not want to comment on the issue without first having a look at the National Trust Act.
Felix pointed out that what he does know is that the Square of the Revolution is public space and anyone can make use of.
He said that people go there to take wedding pictures and don’t have to get permission from Dr Roger Luncheon, Head of the Presidential Secretariat. Felix added that people learn to drive there and even vend without having to get permission but as soon as APNU decided to hold an event there, it became an issue.
