President Ali extends meeting invitation to Fmr. Presidents on Dec 15

Dec 05, 2020 News

Former Presidents Bharrat Jagdeo, Samuel Hinds, Donald Ramotar and David Granger

Kaieteur News – Making good on his promise for inclusive governance, President Irfaan Ali yesterday dispatched invite letters to all of Guyana’s previous presidents for a meeting on December 15.

President Irfaan Ali

The Head of State made the announcement during his address at the Canada-Guyana Chamber of Commerce launch ceremony. According to Ali, there have been no responses to the invite yet, but he is hoping for a fruitful conversation on moving Guyana forward.“Remember in my inauguration speech, I spoke about convening that meeting. So it would be an open floor meeting where we will bring together all the former Presidents. I think that it is an opportunity for us to continue to share ideas, generate ideas, to talk about how we see Guyana’s development, different perspectives and then to work out a model and a framework of how we engage in the future and how we can have continuous contribution,” Ali later explained.The invite list comprises of now Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo; Donald Ramotar; Samuel Hinds, all former PPP/C government presidents and Ali’s immediate predecessor, David Granger. It is unclear whether Granger would be in attendance since his A Partnership For National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) Coalition had failed to recognize the Ali administration as legitimate. Granger himself has refused to concede to Ali despite formerly promising to do so after the GECOM declaration.
The invitation appears to be a departure from Ali’s previous stance. The President had made it clear that before any talk of inclusive governance begins with the Opposition, its leader, Joseph Harmon would have to rescind public statements made, referring to the governing administration as “illegitimate.”
President Ali had stated, “Now if I am working with you, you have to be able to accept that I am the person you want to work with. You can’t speak with someone you don’t recognize, you can’t have a serious discussion with me because you are speaking to someone you don’t recognize. Therefore, we have to get it right. And I hope he (Harmon) gets it right very soon because if you come to me, you can’t come to me to tell me you don’t recognize me and if you are coming to me, it means you recognize me.”