Latest update May 22nd, 2026 12:38 AM
Speaker Nadir threatening war
(Kaieteur News) – We thought that with the Opposition Leader election now settled, that it was time to move on. Move to the many pieces of parliamentary business waiting to be addressed. We must be mistaken, for Speaker of the House, Manzoor Nadir, seems to be itching for a fight.
He is indicating readiness to continue the war that the PPPC Government declared on the leader of We Invest In Nationhood, Azruddin Mohamed, now the chief on the nongovernmental side of parliament’s aisles. When the final curtain came down on the controversies and delays related to the election of Opposition Leader, the first threat boiled over and spilled out of Speaker Nadir.
The Parliamentary Committee of Privileges was waved by the Speaker over Mohamed’s head. He will drag Mohamed before it, so that he can speak out or shut-up about his corruption claims. Corruption claims leveled by Mohamed against Nadir, and to which the latter took fierce objection. “Vile comments” said the Speaker, who then let loose a flood of words. “Anyone who wants to criticise the speaker can do so via a motion in the House. And so, while I have thick skin and my 45 years of public life has tempered me well. I am not adverse to acting firmly…And so those comments leveled at me by the leader of the opposition are among the items which can possibly go before a privilege committee.”
Nadir says that he has “thick skin.”, which must have lost some density, given his reaction. What game is the Speaker playing or, better, whose battles is he fighting? He was the one who started the ball rolling, when he seemingly went out of his way to label Mohamed an ‘international fugitive.’ That was uncalled for, and he should have known better, especially with the neutrality that is associated with the job of Speaker of the House. When he allowed himself to get drawn into Guyana’s ugly political brawls, he didn’t do himself any favors. In going after Mohamed, Nadir went too far, left himself exposed, and looks worse for it. When circumspection was necessary, he let some weakness overtake him, and joined in the cursing.
We appreciate that, as Speaker Nadir himself admitted, he is in a “difficult position.” For the Speaker’s edification, all jobs have those moments, and the bigger the job, the longer and more draining that “difficult position” becomes. If the job is too difficult, and no question that it is for the Speaker, he should do the decent thing and throw in the towel, if only to save face. His preference is to salvage some face, through threatening to go before the Committee of Privileges to get it to haul the WIN leader and cut him down to size.
We have to wonder if this is not a new gimmick being employed by the PPPC Government to make parliamentary life intolerable for Mohamed. The Speaker could be used to tie up Mohamed with a series of unending investigations, possibly censure, and who knows what else, in order to neutralise his parliamentary presence and contributions.
Speaker Nadir has proven to be a zealous and dependable agency to get certain hatchet jobs done. Also, the Speaker of the House has fallen so low that another step down that trapdoor could be seen by him as just another day at work. We think that after the ABC&EU countries raised their voices and made their position on parliament and Opposition Leader, the government has been scheming on how to get around what was drawing to its inevitable end. It is uncanny how well the Speaker timed his threat against Mohamed. No sooner had he been elected Opposition Leader, than Speaker Nadir came out with what appears to us at this paper as another well-thought-out trick to cram Mohamed into a tight corner.
It is long past the time for these farces to come to an end. Parliament is neither the Speaker’s, nor the PPPC Government’s, children’s playground. The nation has serious business before it, and there’s so much that parliament requires rolling up its sleeves and addressing. Speaker Nadir should stop threatening, start moving on. He should get parliament going in high gear, stop lowering himself.
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