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Publish scholarships that were ducked–Rohee to Seelall Persaud
Former Minister of Home Affairs, Clement Rohee, is refuting assertions by current Police Commissioner
Former Home Affairs Minister, Clement Rohee
Seelall Persaud that while in Government, he ‘ducked’ invitations Guyana received for overseas training for members of its police force.
According to Rohee, who took Persaud on during his party’s weekly press conference at Freedom House yesterday, rather than make an accusation that he has not substantiated, Persaud ought to publish whatever information he has at his disposal including information on who were denied opportunities.
“It is totally inaccurate, and I debunk it. It is a falsehood,” a vehement Rohee said. “We were sending lots of people abroad. And then I turned to the Permanent Secretary –the deceased Angela Johnson- (and said) but we are not publicizing it.”
According to Rohee, an agreement was reached with the now dead Permanent Secretary to publicize the event, whenever a police rank or a group of ranks were traveling abroad to participate in training. However, he claimed that some media houses were not publicizing these events,
Pointing out what may have gone wrong in some instances, the General Secretary stated that sometimes the invitation would arrive late or there would be a protracted process to select someone to go on training.
However, he was adamant that he had a good recollection of who went where and that there must be a paper trail dating back from those days.
“If Mr. Persaud is serious about what he is saying, then he should go into the records of the Force Headquarters and publish all of those fully funded scholarships, which he said were ducked at the Ministry of Home Affairs. And then we will see fact from fiction.”
Asked about whether there was a rift between himself and Persaud, Rohee would only say that he would
Commissioner of Police, Seelall Persaud
“write about it in his memoirs.”
Persaud had recently stated that current police successes can be attributed to increased training opportunities. He had also lambasted Rohee for stymieing the training process of officers when he was Home Affairs Minister.
“You know how many fully-funded courses we lost because he (Rohee) didn’t like who was recommended for the course? He did not process them. We needed cabinet approval to leave the country to attend these courses, and they were all stuck at his Ministry,” Persaud told Kaieteur News.
He said that in many cases he had to be following up requests for approval for overseas training with Rohee, but by the time the approval came, the courses would have already started.
According to Persaud, in his 31-year-career in the Guyana Police Force, the organization met its lowest ebb under Rohee’s stewardship as the political head of local law enforcement.
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