David Granger

Leader of the Opposition, Brigadier David Granger has expressed dismay over remarks attributed to President Donald Ramotar in an interview published in the Guyana Chronicle newspaper and has called on him to withdraw his statements.

In a release on Tuesday, it was noted that the Sunday article reported Ramotar accusing the Opposition of pursuing a strong “racial line” in Linden, of “manipulation” of the elections and of acting in “bad faith.”

“Mr. Granger was astonished at the fact that President Ramotar’s remarks were factually incorrect.  They had the added effect of fostering the false impression in the public mind that the Opposition parties had actually broken the law by practising racism and perpetrating electoral fraud.  In negotiations, according to President Ramotar, the Opposition was untrustworthy,” the release from the opposition leader read.

It reports Granger as saying that the charges have the potential to undermine the basis of the current tripartite discussions taking place among the APNU, the AFC and the PPP/C.

The statement continues by saying that Granger was shocked by the lack of evidence provided by the president in light of the gravity of his charges.

“President Ramotar claimed that the Opposition actually "penetrated GECOM and controlled [to some extent] the elections machinery, where they were not even taking instructions from the Chairman or the Chief Elections Officer and they were doing a lot of manipulation, but could not explain how this could have happened.”

“He also claimed, without reason, “For sure, I think we had over 50%.  I think we lost some votes, no doubt, but I don’t think we lost enough to bring us under 50%, but the results were through manipulation. My own realistic assessment was that we had probably between 52 – 53%,” the statement quoted from the Chronicle article.

According to the Leader of the Opposition, Ramotar’s remarks are “untrue, unstatesmanlike, untimely and unhelpful,” and should be withdrawn.