Chairperson of the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) Volda Lawrence says that her government has “shown that it will walk the walk” when it comes to addressing crime but has been hampered from achieving big successes because “people are still afraid to testify.”
Lawrence was speaking at a PNCR press conference at its headquarters, Congress Place, yesterday. The PNCR is the largest constituent of the APNU+AFC coalition government. Asked how her government would be able to convince the electorate to trust them when they have failed to convict any members of the previous government for alleged corruption as well as any of the alleged members of the death squads which terrorised the country for half a decade, Lawrence res-onded that they have tried. She expressed confidence that this effort would be enough.
“Once assuming government, we ensured that we had those investigations done. We are at a junction where we are unable, because of fear, to get persons to bear witness on the stand. We believe that as we continue to work with these people, they will be more comfortable,” she said.
Invoking the provisions of the Protected Disclosures (Whistleblowers) Act, Lawrence argued that its passage can give witnesses the confidence to come forward.
“We believe that as we continue to work with those persons, that they will feel more comfortable, given our passing of the whistleblowers legislation which can, to my knowledge, give them security, [and] take care of the fears which they now harbour,” she said.
Lawrence, also the Minister of Public Health, argued that over the last 20 years, the PNCR has done a good job of putting the facts related to these cases into the public domain and that with just a bit more time, could be able to convince witnesses to take the stand.
More than four years ago, the APNU+ AFC coalition promised their supporters that if they were allowed to govern, they would confront serious crimes – both blue and white collar, arrest the spread of organised gangs and improve public and personal security.
On assuming office, they began a series of forensic audits ostensibly as a means to establish responsibility and thereafter, institute charges for various corrupt acts.
In 2015, a total of $133,045,900 was spent on the 45 audits ordered by the APNU+AFC government but few criminal charges and no convictions have so far resulted from these audits.
Most recently, the continued absence of Special Organised Crime Unit Pro-secutor Lawrence Harris prompted a city magistrate to dismiss several charges against six former Guyana Rice Development Board members, who were accused of failing to record entries for funds amounting to over $200 million in total in the agency’s general ledger.
Speaking on the issue, Lawrence said she was “upset” about the result but expected Attorney General Basil Williams to appeal the dismissal.
