Lalloo Tekchand: `I think the President’s decision is very much unfair to the Guyanese people and it’s very much unconstitutional in the sense that the opposition leader presented on three occasions 18 names and the law is saying that you’re supposed to choose one of the 18 and he went out on one of the darkest nights in Guyana, Diwali night, to make this announcement, an old man who is 84 years, James Patterson, to be the GECOM Chairman. I think to all fairness to the Guyanese people, Mr Granger has breached the law and he’s doing wrong to the country, causing the economic, the political and the social standard to drop within the two years of his administration’.
Tessa Jack: `I think it was right because when the PPP was in power, they appointed who they felt like, threw away the paper behind their back and they did what they felt. So if he appointed the judge, I feel he was right to appoint the judge as GECOM chair’.
Nigel Plass: `I’m pleased with the President’s decision because Guyana doesn’t really have young people that would sit in those positions. We have a lot of young people that are highly qualified but they like to take bribes, they don’t like to work for anything anymore, so that’s the right person. A man with proper age, he has his own house, he has his own car, I don’t think he’d want anything…I suffered for 23 years with these young boys’.
Sohan Lall: `If he’s the President and he can break the law in this country, what about the people? What he expects the private citizens to do in this country? I’m not satisfied with what he did at all, he has to go with the law and the law ran for twenty-something years and he can’t just come and break the law. So it’s wrong what he did. It’s not right’.
Ram Prashad: `The opposition leader appointed three lists of persons to the President of this country and there were 18 persons who Mr Jagdeo sent, why didn’t the President take one of the 18 persons and nominate the GECOM Chairman? He picked someone who didn’t live in the country for over 25 years, Mr James Patterson. He knows nothing about this country. He was saying that he was something in Grenada, which was a lie…Patterson was installed in less than two hours, which is not fair to the Guyanese public. There were 18 persons there, I feel that the President should have appointed someone from those lists. The opposition leader didn’t fail to send a list, he sent three’.
Lieutenant Narine: `What he did was his choice but I think he could have chosen someone that was more fit and proper. I mean, he’s free to do what he wants but I think he should have made another choice, perhaps choose someone from the list. Nothing is wrong with the person he chose except age-wise, but he probably had his reasons for selecting him’.
G Campbell: `My thought about it is that I think that the guy is qualified, he reached all of the requirements, and if you look at it on a different aspect, there was Steve Surubally there, Joe Singh was there before, and they had this chap Doodnauth Singh was there, so I don’t see an issue with bringing this new fella there. He is capable. His age might be one thing but with age comes experience. And when you look at the guy, if you don’t know his age, you can’t know that’s his age. He looks excellent. So I don’t think that they need to bring age into the picture—the guy can do the job, the guy has all the requirements and I think they should give him a chance…Most of these men that Jagdeo put on the list were his people and it was unethical. He’s playing politics. And I think that the President has the right to choose who he wants to choose, he is the President of the day and I think that the man is fit and proper’.
Sattaur Mohammed: `Our opposition leader submitted a list three times, so why couldn’t he pick one person? He chose someone that they need there because they associate together. They have their own way of doing things in this country, and we are the people, we need our rights. He asked for three lists but ended up picking someone on his own, so what was the point? He did what he wanted to do and that is not right to our constitution. Within the laws of our constitution, you guard and protect it, as the President of this country. The best person I nominate as a citizen of this country is Joe Singh because he has all his systems, he knows the country well, he was a GDF executive and he knows what is taking place in this country. You can’t go bring a lawyer from Grenada and who spent 20 years out of this country to come and be GECOM’s elections chairman. You need somebody in Guyana.’
Shawn Gibson: `I think it was a good idea because Granger is an experienced person and I think that everything that he does will be beneficial as such. Sometimes it’s good to have older people in positions because of their experience. Those kinds of positions need experienced people because a youth wouldn’t have really gone through certain things in life, I’m not condemning youths but. I might be wrong but some youths don’t really think first before they act because they’re young and they have that vibrancy and that push, they just want to do things quickly’.
