Politicians must be held accountable for their criminal behaviour and be prosecuted

Jan 23, 2021 Letters

DEAR EDITOR,

Kaieteur News – I have read carefully what was printed in a news article that appeared in the Kaieteur News, Friday, January 22, 2021, edition “Magistrate yet to decide mode of trial for electoral fraud cases”, on page 11, which illustrated 4 photos beside that caption, those of 3 of the 7 Accused, Clairmont Mingo, Volda Lawrence and Keith Lowenfield, and one of the Special Counsels appointed by the Chambers of the Director of Public Prosecutions, Attorney-at-law Glenn Hanoman. I appreciate your thorough style of news reporting on those fraud cases.
Editor, I welcome the exposure that these cases are now receiving in the media in January 2021, and as I am from the Guyanese diaspora, I keenly pay attention from abroad to these cases in the news as they are unfolding.
However, I am left wondering why the Chambers of the Director of Public Prosections, learned as those Chambers are, did not see it fit to jointly charge Karen Cummings with, at least, the offence of conspiracy to commit Fraud, which I strongly believe the evidence will come out at the trial of those facing the music that she was in violation of the criminal laws of Guyana. No one is above the law.
As a lawyer and one who has also prosecuted cases, whenever a file is being taken over from a private prosecution, the duty of the assessor is to determine whether others who broke the law can also be charged jointly or otherwise.
I therefore urge the team leader of the prosecutorial team to reassess the evidence and decide whether that former government official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs should be joined in the indictment. Politicians must be held accountable for their criminal behaviour and be prosecuted. Short of that justice sector policy, the populace at large will take cognisant of the fact that a new precedent of such behaviour will be set, that whenever one gets into government positions, one can behave in similar fashion as Karen Cummings, that is to say, flout the criminal laws of Guyana, conspire to commit fraud, but due to a high official rank, a Minister cannot be indicted with your alleged accomplices. Let us not forget this individual behaved rather unforgivable when she abused many Diplomats and Foreign Observers at the venue, so set up by GECOM, and I feel strongly she ought to be tried for her alleged crime(s), as GECOM is not her domain, and her behaviour was in my humble view, criminalistic. This individual’s action, in my view, which appeared to have been done when she was conspiring with others (some of whom had indeed been charged by the State) to commit fraud, and if such an appearance is indeed the facts, and the truth that lay therein in the actions of those charged for their alleged deeds done on those days in March 2020 is totally reprehensible. It is an alleged crime that was perpetrated on Foreign Diplomats and other Dignitaries, including and not forgetting Stephen Hiscock Former British High Commissioner and the late Sir Arthur Owen former Barbados P.M., as well as the Guyanese people.
In my humble opinion, such an omission in the Criminal Indictment could lead to other weakness(es) in the prosecution’s case, if they aren’t to be seen at the trials, because were I to be a Defence Attorney, I would wish to get an answer as to why Karen Cummings was not also charged when the evidence seems to indicate that she had on a certain, convenient date in March, 2020, just at the precise juncture when the Nation was awaiting the results, committed electoral fraud by stopping that process, and deliberately rejecting the credentials of the already invited Caricom Observer Team, thus furthering the alleged fraud, which was being allegedly perpetrated by her alleged accomplices, Volda Lawrence, Clairmont Mingo, Keith Lowenfield, Enrique Livan Sheffern February and Roxanne Myers. As a lawyer with a political science major from undergraduate degree years, it is my strong belief that in a direct democracy where the rule of law is intact, no one should be above the law, and that should include a person who does acts while he or she is the Foreign Minister in such a democracy.

Faithfully yours,
“M. Shabeer Zafar”
Barrister, Solicitor, Notary
(Ontario)

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