Latest update April 4th, 2025 6:13 AM
Transaction was a private affair – Luncheon
Ed Ahmad’s shipment to State House…
The shipment of 29 tons of building supplies to State House, by embattled United States-based Guyanese,
Ed Ahmad
Ed Ahmad, in 2009, is in all likelihood a private transaction, government spokesman Dr. Roger Luncheon says.
Fielding questions from the media during his weekly briefing, the official declined to comment on the shipment which was addressed to the State House on Main Street, the President’s official residence.
The 2009 shipment was one of the arguments that US prosecutors used late last month to convince a judge not to grant Queen’s businessman, Ed Ahmad permission to travel to Guyana.
According to Luncheon, the transactions “might” be a more “informative exchange by the principals”.
“In essence, what I am saying with regards to the shipment of goods by the businessman to the President…I would still be constrained by a private transaction.”
Dr. Roger Luncheon
Luncheon made it clear that any answers would have to come from the President or Ahmad.
“…and were the President and Mr. Ahmad…the two principals…were they inclined to make this a public issue… that may very well be the beginning of a response, a suitable response.”
Ahmad was arrested late last month, shortly before he boarded a flight to Guyana.
He, according to US press reports, landed in hot water after loaning money to US Representative Gregory Meeks.
Ahmad, who loaned Meeks $40,000 in 2007, had sought to visit Guyana to transact an important real estate deal.
According to the New York Post, the businessman – who currently faces charges in New York that he used straw buyers to defraud a bank of hundreds of thousands of dollars – has political friends in high places in Guyana, too, his attorney told Brooklyn federal Magistrate Judge Steven Gold.
“He’s personal friends with the current president and the past president,” said Ahmad’s attorney Steven Kartagener.
Meeks, who is under federal probe for his role in a Queens charity, repaid Ahmad’s personal loan with 12.5 percent interest — after the FBI questioned Ahmad about it.
Ahmad had opened a hardware outlet in Guyana at the offices that once housed the Mirror newspaper, on Mandela Avenue.
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