Region 2 Councilors did not unanimously vote against Ministerial pay increase

Nov 04, 2015 Letters

Dear Editor,
Guyana Times reporter in Region Two has several articles, written by Indrawattie Natram, that are misleading and bordering on questionable journalism. She mentioned me as the Prime Minister’s Representative in one of her stories so I take this opportunity to set things straight by presenting the truth.
I was there when the REO upbraided her for what he opined was misleading information written by her in the Guyana Times. He reprimanded her for writing that there was a dead cow in the canal at Lima Sands contaminating the water. He said that he sent workers to investigate and they did not find any dead cow anywhere.
While speaking to her, she was not prepared to listen him out, but kept interrupting him. There was not attempt to muzzle her. What she should have done is wait until he was finished speaking, then reply. She, of all persons should know that in interviewing or dialoguing each speaker should wait his or her turn. She should have listened to the REO then reply. Writing that the REO tried to muzzle her is highly unprofessional, immature and misleading.
In another edition of the Guyana Times (Wednesday 21 October), she wrote that all the members of the Region Two RDC unanimously voted against the Ministerial pay increase. This is far from the truth. In fact, eight PPP/C members (four were absent) voted against the pay increase.
The five APNU and AFC members abstained by keeping their hands down. I was there as an observer in the gallery. Eight out of a Council of seventeen members is far from unanimous. I visited Ms. Nathram in her office and pointed out her mistake to her by explaining what unanimous means. Mr. Ragendra Prabulall, the Information Officer for Region Two, was there. He advised her in my presence to correct her mistake in another article. I am not aware that the correction was done.
Editor, in the interest of public information and for damage control, I write to correct the misinformation fed to readers in Guyana Times. Ms. Natram uses certain words incorrectly perhaps due to lack of knowledge of maybe to promote opposition propaganda and undermine the credibility and efforts of the government. This cannot be tolerated and passed off as information and professionalism.
More recently the Guyana Times erroneously reported that “Region 2 Information Office staff sent home.” (October 29, edition). The fact is that the Information Officer, Mr. Prabulall, retired 0n October 31. Before that, he was on pre-retirement leave. His trainee, whom he took employed to understudy him and succeed him, had to leave because of his departure. She was not an employee of the Region and was there not in an official capacity.
The third person, Indrawattie Natram, is a reporter for Guyana times, a privately own newspaper aligned with the opposition PPP. She was accommodated in that information office through the patronage of the last government and has to find a private office somewhere else. She is still employed. So the truth is that none of these three people were fired.
This is all in the agenda of the opposition to undermine the efforts of this new government. The “ Beacon of Truth’’ should at least learn to differentiate facts from fabrication.
Karan Chand

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