Gov’t postpones Thursday’s sitting of the Nat’l Assembly, APNU to challenge

Last Updated on Saturday, 26 December 2015, 21:01 by GxMedia

Thursday’s sitting of the National Assembly has been cancelled says the Parliament Office.

This was disclosed in a one line statement which gave the new date for the next sitting as August 7, three days before the House is to go on a two-month recess.

Additionally, Demerara Waves Online has seen a letter from Prime Minister Samuel Hinds to Speaker Raphael Trotman in which he said the postponement was to facilitate consultations “at the highest level” in order to secure support and passage of the opposition-rejected Amaila legislation before the recess.

The letter was also copied to Leader of the Opposition David Granger but when contacted by DemWaves he said that his party would be challenging the postponement which he described as a “unilateral action” on the part of the government.

The APNU Chairman said their Shadow Cabinet would be meeting Wednesday night before issuing a statement on the matter.

The four local government bills were scheduled to be debated on Thursday with the government indicating that it was unhappy with two of them.

The opposition parties had linked passage of the Hydro-Electric (Amendment) Bill and a motion to raise the debt ceiling to an assurance from the president that he would assent to all four bills after passage through the House.

But so far a concrete commitment has not been forthcoming with the government accusing the parties of political blackmail.

In refusing to start the debate at the last sitting after the opposition manuevered the bills to the top of the day’s business the government had indicated that it would be prepared to debate the bills the following day. However at the end of the sitting Hinds adjourned the House until this Thursday after an opposition motion to stick to the initial day was defeated for want of a vote. The House Leader said the change was done to facilitate further consultations between the parties.