Opposition Leader, David Granger on Friday said he was banking on Guyanese to help push Home Affairs Minister, Clement Rohee out of office if President Donald Ramotar ignores a majority-opposition approved no-confidence motion.

Addressing the unveiling of a monument in Buxton honour of 400 people allegedly killed at the hands of police and death squads in recent years, Granger cautioned that the no-confidence motion was not the end of the matter.

“Clement Rohee will be pushed out of office not only by the motion in the National Assembly but public opinion. If he doesn’t go, he’ll be pushed,” said Granger, a retired Brigadier of the Guyana Defence Force.

The opposition used its one-seat majority to vote a no-confidence in Rohee following the July 18 killing of three protesters during clashes with police at the Mackenzie-Linden bridge.

Granger, who was recently elected leader of the Peoples National Congress Reform (PNCR), recalled that after the 2004 Presidential Commission of Inquiry into alleged state-sponsored killings, then Home Affairs Minister Ronald Gajraj resigned following an outcry from the diplomatic community.

He said if President Donald Ramotar does not want to convene a commission of inquiry into police killings, the National Assembly would do so. Granger suggested that the opposition parliamentary coalition A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and the Alliance For Change (AFC) would team up to ensure a probe is conducted into police killings in places like Buxton, Agricola, Linden and Georgetown. “You voted for us and we would not let you down.

He flayed the administration for ignoring 164 recommendations by the Disciplined Forces Commission and turning down a British-funded 3 million pounds sterling Security Sector Reform Programme.

Commending fellow villager Morris Wilson for having the “foresight and the courage,” for giving Buxton its second monument, Professor David Hinds urged the gathering to engage in the “final charge against this dictatorship” in the same way that Africans fought against slavery and colonialism.

Hinds emphasised the importance of education and appealed to teachers to slash their lessons fees by 50 percent to help create an “army of educated people” towards the road to freedom.

“Those of you who give lessons, I understand but I want to challenge you when the new term begins to cut your lessons fee by half. It’s the practical thing that you can do because if you cut it in half you are assured of two times the number of young people who can benefit from your lessons,” he said.

AFC Executive Member, Nigel Hughes, in his address, urged a unified approach by all Guyanese to secure constitutional reform that would ensure that all Guyanese are involved in decision-making.

“We cannot have a system that will continue to give a minority a hundred percent of power and if we decide to go to another election under the system that continues to exclude us, we will have nobody else but ourselves to blame,” said Hughes.

Hughes public statement appears to be the first forceful public statement by his party that it supports some form of power sharing.

Hughes’ name is being touted in some circles as one of the top two AFC running mates for the next general elections. He is making increasing public appearances in mainly African Guyanese communities while former long-serving Peoples Progressive Party (PPP) executive member, Moses Nagamootoo has been working the sugar belt and other agricultural areas predominantly populated by East Indo Guyanese.

The monument which is located opposite Tipperary Hall at Buxton Middle Walk is the brainchild of Buxtonian, Morris Wilson. According to him, he wanted to  dramatize in a lasting manner the scourge of extrajudicial killings over the last two decades and also to properly honour the victims, most of whom perished between 2002 and 2006.