General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP), Bharrat Jagdeo has challenged President David Granger to publicly say he will not be sworn in on the basis of the declarations made last week by Returning Officer Clairmont Mingo.
“It could easily go away if Granger states publicly what he said to Mia Mottley…if he says that he will refuse to be sworn in on the basis of results that are not transparent,” Jagdeo said of the current stalemate.
Speaking at his weekly press conference which was moved to Freedom House, the former Opposition Leader maintained that the President cannot distance himself for the court case which is to be heard today at 9am.
He dismissed Granger’s claim that the CARICOM supervised recount was “stalled” by “an independent court action”
This is not an independent court action it was filed by one of the APNU candidates…Granger refuses to take responsibility for anything [but] he is at the centre of everything. I believe Granger tacitly approves this whole thing. He is not powerless,” Jagdeo stressed.
He noted that the President acknowledged that the stalling of the recount will not lead to a transparent conclusion to the 2020 General and Regional Elections and maintained that he can make the impediments go away.
“All he is has to do today is make such a statement to allow this to go away. If he truly believes what he told Mia Mottley he can stop this,” he reiterated adding that the intention he believes is to push through the case to have Granger sworn in over the weekend.
Jagdeo explained that his party which has applied as a respondent in the matter intends to vigorously pursue the issue in court.
The former president ruled out street protests as a response to the stalemate because of concerns surrounding COVID-19.
“Because of Corona Virus we have to be careful…we don’t want it to spread,” he explained.
Noting that Minister of Finance Winston Jordan has approached the World Bank to seek funding to tackle the spread of COVID-19, Jagdeo stressed that there are no ministers right now.
He added that his party will embrace sanctions against Granger and all his ‘cohorts’.
“We’ll ask for stoppage of all the funds flowing from multi-lateral institutions. Already there is bilateral curtailment…we will ask the IMF and IDB to shut down all disbursements to Guyana,” he said adding that the party will also pursue sanctions against individuals.
High Court judge Franklyn Holder on Tuesday granted an injunction restraining the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) from authorising a recount of ballots cast at the March 2 elections based on the agreement between President David Granger and Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo.
The interim injunction, which was among four granted on Tuesday afternoon, effectively places a halt on any attempts at a recount of the ballots cast at the regional and general elections.
An independent high-level team from CARICOM had flown-in over the weekend to supervise the recount of ballots due to controversy over the tabulation of the votes cast for Region Four, which opposition parties as well as international and local observers say was not done in a transparent manner.
As a result of the court order, the team withdrew from the recount process, which had been due to begin since Monday.
