PPP charges Opposition parties with supporting criminal activities
‘Our position is…we are unreservedly, 100 per cent, against any type of torture’ - PPP
THE ruling People’s Progressive Party (PPP) has expressed concern over the refusal of the Opposition parties to vote on a motion in Parliament, seeking to express appreciation of the Joint Services work in capturing “the most dangerous criminal Guyana has ever known.”

The PPP said the attitude of declining to vote was yet another confirmation that the Opposition, particularly the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR), has been giving tactical support to criminal activities in the country.

It appears as though the sympathies of those parties are with the bandits and against law enforcement agencies, said a PPP statement which called on the PNCR, Alliance for Change (AFC) and Guyana Action Party/Rise Organise and Rebuild (GAP/ROAR) to re-examine their position on this issue.

The statement, read by PPP General Secretary, Mr. Donald Ramotar at a Freedom House Press Conference in Robb Street, Georgetown, said, on the same day the motion was tabled, the PNCR tried to tarnish the image of the security forces by bringing a motion about torture against the Police.

He observed, too, that AFC Leader, Mr. Raphael Trotman, after attacking the PPP motion, left the National Assembly with his colleague Mr. Khemraj Ramjattan but they returned to support the “ridiculous allegation of torture” contained in the PNCR’s.

Ramotar declared that such a move by the two AFC leaders was tantamount to clear political opportunism and can only encourage criminal activities in Guyana.

He said the recent action by the Opposition parties follows a series of vicious attacks by them on the nation’s security forces.

In that perspective, the PPP deduced that, since the prison escape of 2002, more Police officers have been murdered by the criminal gang than during the entire previous history of the Force which spans more than 150 years, Ramotar said.

He alluded to some of the most atrocious crimes committed by the gang recently led by Rondell Rawlins alias ‘Fine Man’ and mentioned the massacres at Lusignan and Bartica, the killing of Minister Satyadeow Sawh and that of the eight persons at Lindo Creek.

Ramotar said they all demonstrate the terroristic nature of the gang and the Joint Services deserve the appreciation of the people of this country for arresting a part of the gang and eliminating another during confrontations.

He assured that the PPP will continue to support the work of the Disciplined Forces and always encourage their efforts in the fight against crimes and criminals in this society.

Ramotar voiced his party’s total opposition to torture in any form and wherever it exists and committed it to continue upholding the human rights of all people.

“Our position is, as we have expressed during the debate, we are unreservedly, 100 per cent, against any type of torture.”

He reminded that many of their members had suffered torture at the hands of the PNC regime when the PPP was in the Opposition and affirmed that there is no way that, as a political party, the PPP will ever want to use torture as a means of extracting confessions and things of that nature from people.