The investigation of former APNU+AFC Member of Parliament (MP) Charrandass Persaud, who is accused of accepting a bribe and voting with the PPP/C on the December 21 motion of no confidence will only continue once “other witnesses” comes forward.
Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan made this disclosure on Wednesday while he was speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an event held at the Officers Training Centre, Camp Street.
“That investigation will continue if we are going to get other witnesses coming forward. Right now none of the other witnesses want to come forward but we have a fair idea what happened,” Ramjattan said.
This disclosure came months after Ramjattan had said that the investigation was stalled and there is no “solid” evidence to have Persaud extradited.
“…Charrandass has since left and the investigators, I think, were supposed to ask him some questions but they are not getting him…whatever was the status for the past couple of months, it has just stuck there,” Ramjattan had told reporters.
Since Persaud voted in favour of the opposition-sponsored motion against the government, triggering its collapse, he has come under attack from APNU+AFC MPs, officials of the administration and others. Critics have said that the investigation was politically motivated and had no basis.
The motion was debated on December 21 and passed 33 to 32 after Persaud voted with the opposition.
Persaud, who said he voted according to his conscience, has denied being bribed for his vote.
He left for Canada the day after the vote.
In January, Commissioner of Police Leslie James had announced that Persaud was the subject of an investigation stemming from a report of bribery and possible plans to move gold out of the country.
“It’s a report of alleged bribery and perhaps some movement of gold from the state of Guyana,” James had told a press conference.
He had said that the police were conducting “an impartial investigation” into the matter, while noting that Persaud was innocent until proven guilty.
“What we have are statements which embodied certain things that I would not disclose for obvious reasons. We cannot say about monies, we can’t say about this, we can’t say about that… the person we are investigating, he is innocent until proven guilty and I would not be prejudicial with this investigation. This is an impartial investigation we have undertaken,” James had explained, before adding that at the conclusion of the investigation, the police would seek legal advice on the way forward.
A number of gold miners were also interviewed as part of the probe.
