Who’s really in charge at Corriverton?

Jun 11, 2012 News

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Mayor says he never received formal notification to demit office

Ousted Mayor of Corriverton, Roy Baijnauth, says that neither he nor his seven councillors of the Corriverton Municipality ever received a formal notification or correspondence from the Local Government Minister or Ministry with valid signatures, informing them of the termination of their services.

Baijnauth showed Kaieteur News two faxes which were sent to his office and received by the Town Clerk a few weeks ago informing them that an Interim Management Committee (IMC) had been formed to replace the council. The faxes, both titled ‘Public Notice’ bore no signatures and were not addressed to anyone in particular from the Corriverton M&TC, not even the Mayor.
This has created a political vacuum in the town. As a result, the question must be asked if Baijnauth was never officially notified by the Minister himself through a signed document, then who really is legally in control of Corriverton.
A few weeks ago, Minister of Local Government, Ganga Persaud, and a team of Government officials, including Member of Parliament, Faizal M. Jaffarally, installed nine Interim Management Committees (IMCs) in Berbice.
Eight Neighbourhood Democratic Councils (NDCs)– Canefield- Enterprise; Ordnance/Fort Lands 38; Enfield- New Doe Park; Kilcoy- Chesney; Maida-Tarlogie; Black Bush Polder; Bush Lot- Adventure, and Whim- Bloomfield were dissolved. The Corriverton Mayor and Town Council was dissolved soon after and IMCs were installed to manage their affairs.
When Kaieteur News contacted MP Jaffarally, he said that an investigation into the affairs of Baijnauth’s town council was carried out and several irregularities were found. But Baijnauth is asking for that report to be made public. Jaffarally had said that one of the findings of the report was that Baijnauth and his councillors do not go out and meet the people and listen to their issues. Baijnauth responded by saying that “if you go and meet the people, they will make a lot of demands” and said that the tight budget that the council had to operate was not really enough to satisfy works that the residents would ask them to do during meetings.
“Them [the government] a go and meet people and fool people— that’s why people a curse them!” Baijnauth said.
He added that the Town Clerk received the fax on May 14 at 14:24 hrs titled ‘Public Notice’. The notice identified the new IMC members.
The fax had no official signature or any line that stated that Baijnauth and his councillors were to leave their positions. “They can’t send the town clerk anything! I am the town clerk’s boss and they put pressure on the young man!” “Nobody told him [the town clerk] Baijnauth is not the Mayor anymore.”
The fax, he said, was just an ordinary notice and Baijnauth added that “I could have told the town clerk to put the thing in the waste paper basket”. “If you take this thing (the fax) and show any educated person, they will throw it away.”
In this regard, he is still maintaining he is the Mayor of the town.
He added that perhaps the document did not have a signature of either the Minister or any senior Local Government Ministry official “because nobody want to commit themselves— that’s why nobody ain’t want to sign it!”
“I have been supporting the PPP since I know myself— them chaps this who come the other day, them doing wrong things”, he said.  Baijnauth has been the Mayor for the town for 17 years and feels deeply hurt over how the events in the recent weeks have transpired.
“They could have shown some appreciation— all of us were glad to have been given the opportunity to serve the people of Corriverton and Guyana as a whole”, he related.
He stated that on May 30, something interesting took place. The IMC and the M&TC of Corriverton planned the statutory meeting on the same day. Both entities clashed and met each other in the M&TC office and Baijnauth then asked his town clerk to call the Minister and Region 6 Chairman to “tell them what was going on”.
The Town Clerk, he claimed, told him that a senior official in Region 6 told him (the town clerk) over the phone that “if the mayor misbehaves, they will get the police and put us out of here”.
Baijnauth added that to avoid a major confrontation that day, he and his councillors peacefully walked out of the building and allowed the IMC to hold the meeting. “The police know I am the mayor and if they did come that day I might have had cause to tell them to put the IMC out, then what would have happened, look at the disgrace that would have taken place”.
Baijnauth added that his town was “not short of leadership” and claimed that the government was bullish in its operations in the town whereby the council was not really informed whenever the government was carrying out works within the township.
“The government did not inform us about doing streets in Corriverton until they went and signed the contracts, then they told us to go. Why they want us then?” He wants President Donald Ramotar to send a team to the area with whom he will meet “with my councillors and let us go and see the roads they (the government) made and see if I am wrong”.
The current Corriverton IMC has ten PPP members. There is no opposition member on the IMC, even though the previous Corriverton M&TC had 3 PNC members.

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