Rohee dubs Nagamootoo’s statements on Sean Hinds ‘a huge joke’

Jul 28, 2015 News

– says the PM has a wide imagination, is good at “spinning things”

By Abena Rockcliffe
General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP), Clement Rohee, yesterday dismissed claims made by Prime Minister, Moses Nagamootoo, to the effect that Sean Hinds was seen lurking around his home two weeks ago. Rohee

Prime Minister,
Moses Nagamootoo

also brushed aside Nagamootoo’s concerns that a criminal syndicate may have been attached to the PPP.
On Saturday last, Nagamootoo told reporters that one of the suspects held by the police for the murder of political activist, Courtney Crum-Ewing, was trying to get close to him under a disguise of a bodyguard.
“But his (Rajput Naraine’s) nervousness when he approached me saying he will watch my back is what struck me,” said Nagamootoo. Naraine was also the bodyguard of former Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall.
Nagamootoo had noted suspicions that Naraine and Hinds may have been part of a PPP-orchestrated plot that had his assassination as its climax. He said that the plot was hinted at when Rohee said during the elections campaign that, “who ain’t end up dead will be badly wounded.”
Yesterday, as he hosted PPP’s weekly press conference at Freedom House, Rohee rubbished Nagamootoo’s statements calling them a “huge joke.”
The General Secretary who claimed to be one of the few people knowing the “real Nagamootoo,” said that the Prime Minister is “good at spinning things”
“If there is anyone in this country who knows Nagamootoo (well), politically and otherwise, I am one of them, so I would not take Nagamootoo’s statement seriously. He is good at what he is saying, he is good at spinning things, he is good at concocting things, he has a wide imagination,” said Rohee.
Rohee also distanced himself and his party from Hinds, who had confessed to being part of the death squad that reigned during the early 2000s.
He admitted that he did see Hinds in Freedom House last week but claimed that he did not pay him much

Sean Hinds

attention.
The General Secretary said that upon noticing Hinds sitting downstairs at Freedom House, he enquired about his purpose of visit and was told by Hinds that he was there to see someone. Rohee said he responded with an “Oh” and went about his business.
“I never asked him who the someone was. I just left and went away,” said Rohee.
The former Home Affairs Minister also sought to make it clear that there is no relationship between the PPP and Hinds but said that even such a man who admitted to conspiracy to commit a crime is “innocent until proven guilty.”
Last week, Sean Hinds admitted on national television that he was part of a death squad that hunted and gunned down suspected criminals during the crime spree of 2002/2003, when the PPP was still in office.
He claimed that last week he was forced to seek refuge at Freedom House as it was rumoured that he was wanted by the police for Crum-Ewing’s murder.
However, yesterday Rohee said as far as he knows, the PPP never had any arrangement, security or otherwise, with Hinds.
But during the last elections, Hinds was spotted at all of the PPP’s major rallies and he also served as the personal bodyguard for former Town Clerk Carol Sooba.
He said that he was paid well over $400,000 monthly to guard Sooba but did so with a “toy gun.”’
Hinds had told Travis Chase of Nightly News, that while he served as a member of the death squad, he received instructions from the “very top” on who to kill, how to kill them and how to dispose of their remains.