by STAFF WRITER
January 24, 2022
GEORGETOWN, Guyana, Jan 24, CMC- The opposition A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) has filed a motion of no-confidence in the Speaker of the National Assembly, Manzoor Nadir, amid concerns that sanctions could be imposed on opposition legislators following the chaos that erupted in the Parliament last month to block debate and passage of wealth fund legislation.
“The Speaker has demonstrated partiality and brought the Office of the Speaker into disrepute and public ridicule and the National Assembly into public odium, as from the inception of his tenure, the Speaker has routinely shown bias against the Opposition and its Members by, inter alia, refusing to allow debates on matters of an urgent, definite and public nature,” according to the opposition motion.
It has listed several alleged transgressions by Nadir and is urging the National Assembly to “declare its loss of confidence” in him.
But the APNU+AFC controls 31 of the 65 seats in the National assembly would even though the motion would need a simple majority to pass, the opposition would need at least one of the 33 members of the ruling people’s progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) to go along with the measure as well as securing the sole seat of the Liberty and Justice Party (LJP).
In the motion, the APNU+AFC alleges that the Speaker has refused to allow debates on matters of an urgent, urgent, definite and public nature, including the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic; the recent floods and striking down, refusing debate and unjustly amending opposition questions and motions.
It says he has also failed to protect opposition legislators, particularly female members, from the insults, invectives and abuses of government parliamentarians as well as failing and refusing to offer protection to an opposition parliamentarian who was allegedly physically assaulted by a government minister and ordering the “lock out” of elected parliamentarians from the Chamber.
The APNU+AFC has also filed a separate motion calling for 22 government parliamentarians, including Prime Minister Mark Phillips, to be sent to the Privileges Committee for disciplinary action to be taken against them because their “conduct and behaviour was unparliamentary” and brought the Parliament and the National Assembly “into disrepute and invited public odium into the affairs of the Assembly.”
CMC/gt/ir/2022
