Attorney General suggests APNU+AFC Walton-Desir’s comments illegal

Last Updated on Wednesday, 5 May 2021, 16:06 by Denis Chabrol

Amanza Walton-Desir

Attorney General Anil Nandlall has indicated that utterances by opposition lawmaker, Amanza Walton-Desir violate Guyana’s laws.

“Racial discrimination is a wrong. It is an illegal act. It is outlawed by the most Supreme Law of our country,” he said. Mr. Nandlall said Guyana’s Constitution protects citizens against racial discrimination. “Racial discrimination is something that the constitution protects Guyanese from as a fundamental right and freedom. There is no person who has a right to speak that way and in those terms against any person in this country or segment of persons in this country,” he said.

The Attorney General was weighing on Social Media on Monday evening on the war of words that have erupted between her and city businessman, Roshan Khan over his call for her to be “marked” for saying that People’s Progressive Party (PPP) supporters are “mentally lazy people”.

Attorney-at-Law, Anil Nandlall

Mr. Nandlall, whose PPP is largely supported by Indo-Guyanese,  said A Partnership for National Unity+Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) parliamentarian was stereotyping people who are far more accomplished that she can ever be.”

Even as police were investigating Ms. Walton-Desir’s complaint against Mr. Khan, he was on Social Media defending his call for her to be “marked” for what she said, when she said and saying that no one should vote for her party unless an apology was issued. He said Indo-Guyanese, Afro-Guyanese and all other ethnicities should picket her at Parliament and her home peacefully as well as call for her expulsion.

Roshan Khan

Veteran Guyanese politician, Vincent Alexander, on the other hand, has reasoned due to historical experiences that unlike Afro-Guyanese, East Indians are largely wedded together through Hinduism. “Indo-Guyanese oscillate largely around the Hindu religion and (Eusi) Kwayana even said in his writings that even those Indo-Guyanese who are not Hindus, by virtue of their involvement in the same community, the same history, they tend to be Hinduised and so my argument here is that Indo-Guyanese are likely to have an ideational base that is universal to them as opposed to other groups of Guyanese who may be described as Westerners,” said Mr. Alexander, a former executive member of the mainly Afro-Guyanese backed People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR).

Vincent Alexander.

He further argued that Afro-Guyanese are not a monolithic group, except for their Africaness. “They come from different ethnic groups and their experiences here not necessarily led to them evolving as one ethnic group though when you talk about ethnicity, you tend to see them that way and there is a reason why we should see them that way in the context of the rest of the society,” he said on Politics 101 with David Hinds.

Mr. Alexander supported Ms. Walton-Desir’s call for an open conversation on race and politics in Guyana. Instead of addressing issues, Mr. Alexander said the trend has been to attack him instead of his postures, a situation in which she now finds herself in confronting a national problem.

The Attorney General said none of her political colleagues or party has condemned her.