PPP accuses Minister Bulkan of making illegal appointments in tied LAAs

Minister of Communities, Ronald Bulkan is being accused by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) of illegally appointing Mayor, Deputy Mayor, Chairpersons and Vice Chairpersons in the six (6) tied Local Authority Areas (LAA), subsequent to the March 18^th, Local Government Elections.

The party expressed outrage at what it described as the ” illegal, unaccountable, non-transparent actions.”

This pattern of behaviour, it noted, continues to be the practice of the David Granger Administration.

The Opposition stated further that “subsequent to that March 18^th Local Government Elections, the PPP, concerned about the conflict surrounding the electoral procedures to break the deadlock on the elections of Mayor and Deputy Mayor and Chairpersons and Vice Chairpersons, obtained the advice of their lawyers. That advice that was disclosed called for by-elections for the top positions in the tied LAAs once the deadlock was declared.”

It claims that the Chief Executive Officer of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) undertook to brief the Minister Bulkan accordingly.

“Recognizing the significant logistics of by-elections, the PPP offered to negotiate with the governing Coalition. The terms discussed included rotation of the two (2) top positions in the municipality and the Neighbourhood Democratic Councils (NDCs) annually, with the plurality being used to determine the distribution of the LAAs whose top positions would be shared between the two sides,” PPP said.

It was also disclosed that on Sunday, April 3, 2016 the two negotiators, PPP’s Gail Teixeira and Amna Ally from the governing Coalition met, however, the party related that the representative of the ruling Coalition rejected the earlier terms, “insisted on no rotations, plurality governing the split of LAAs between the two (2) sides and the service for the entire term of office for the Councils.”

On Monday April 4, 2016 the Minister of Communities in violation of the law commenced the appointments and completed them by Tuesday, April 5 2016, even in those areas where they had  not gain a majority of popular votes in those LAAs the PPP claims.

The PPP also expressed its intention to pursue the matter “aggressively including immediate litigation and protests against the Minister of Communities and his illegal decision by aggrieved stakeholders at the Local Authority Areas.”