Summoning of New York-based activist to appear in Guyana court amounts to human rights violation– Norton, Forde

Last Updated on Monday, 1 January 2024, 8:49 by Denis Chabrol

Opposition Leader Aubrey Norton on Monday-New Year’s Day 2024- said the serving of summonses to New York-based Guyanese opposition activist, Rickford Burke, is a sign of the further deterioration of human rights by the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPPC)-led administration.

“Its assault on our freedoms of expression and association reached even more dangerous heights, as the recent court summons served on US-based political activist Rickford Burke starkly demonstrate,” Mr Norton said in his New Year’s Day message.

Accompanied by Guyana Police Force Assistant Superintendent, Rodwell Sarabo, a United States Process Server presented two summonses to Mr Burke at his Maple Street, Brooklyn, New York home on December 16, 2023 for him to appear in court on March 28, 2024 to answer two charges of publication of defamatory libel in order to extort money from Afras Mohammed. A wanted bulletin had been issued on September 29, 2022 and the two charges were filed on August 18, 2023.

In reviewing 2023, the Political Scientist said Guyanese witnessed further assaults by the PPP on governance and democracy. “The Police Force continued to be used as a political tool,” he said.

Guyanese police, back in December 2021, issued a wanted bulletin for Mr Burke for the excitement of hostility or ill-will on the grounds

of Race, under the Racial Hostility Act; sedition under the Cyber Crime Act; use of a computer system to coerce and intimidate a person, under the Cyber Crime Act; seditious libel contrary to common law; seditious libel under the peace under the Summary Jurisdiction Offences Act and inciting public terror under the Criminal Law Offences Act. Mr Burke has over the years accused the PPPC administration of corruption and political and racial discrimination against Afro-Guyanese and others who oppose the government.

Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo has also come under stinging criticism from Shadow Attorney General, Attorney-at-Law Roysdale Forde for warning people, even though they may be overseas, that criminal proceedings would be taken against them for criticising the PPPC administration. “Publicly declaring an intention to go after social media influencers, residing within and beyond our borders, critical of the PPP/C government is not only a violation of democratic fundamentals but also an incredibly troubling display of power that is fatal to freedom of speech and free speech,” Mr Forde said.

Mr Forde called on Guyanese, particularly those living in the Diaspora regardless of which political party they support, to use social media, to condemn government for silencing dissent by fearing reprisal should they enjoy their fundamental right to freedom of expression.

Despite outcry from the Guyana Press Association, Guyana Human Rights Association and the PPPC then in opposition, the then PNCR-led coalition under then President David Granger went ahead in 2018 and passed the Cyber Crime Act.

At his news conference on December 28, Mr Jagdeo, who is also the PPP’s General Secretary, made it clear that the State would take legal action against persons overseas on social media who spew baseless claims about people and their families without evidence, engage in extortion or break Guyana’s laws. “I hope that the other social media influencers, who are operating under the guise that they are not in our jurisdiction and they feel safe abroad, safe from the reach of our law that they’re taking note too. And I hope that anyone who they malign, people who they malign, you sue them now and hire somebody abroad- authorised people- to serve them the notice or the summon and you make sure they video it, like they did with Rickord Burke, and then you go proceed in court so that the trial can take place,” he said.

The Shadow Attorney General accused Mr Jagdeo of double-standards by being associated with a known party affiliate, who has been using his social media platform to launch verbal attacks against government critics, and whom the Vice President has been entertaining at special one- on- one interviews, has been awarded a state contract under questionable circumstances.

“This raises serious questions about the integrity of the government’s contracting processes and the ethical standards upheld by our highest – ranking officials. The blatant misuse and abuse of power to suppress dissent coupled with preferential treatment accorded to those align with the ruling party (PPP/C), presents an extremely distressing picture of our political landscape,” Mr Forde added.

He warned that the incumbent government could be using Guyana’s enormous oil wealth to stifle dissenting voices and imperil the country’s fledgling democracy. “The interplay between oil money and the abuse of power undermines the foundation of democracy and creates a suitable environment for injustice, and inequality,” he said.

Under the Jagdeo presidency from 1999 to 2011, CNS and HBTV 9 television station licences had been suspended, television journalist Gordon Moseley had been banned from his news conferences and government advertisements had been withdrawn from the privately-owned independent Stabroek News newspaper. He had also labelled sections of the media “hostile” and “carrion crows”.

Guyana’s Constitution guarantees the fundamental right to freedom to hold opinions without interference, freedom to receive ideas
and information without interference, freedom to communicate ideas and information without interference and freedom from interference with his or her correspondence.

However, that right is limited by laws governing interests of defence, public safety, public order, public morality or public health as well as reasonable requirements for protecting the reputations, rights, and freedoms of other persons or the private lives of persons concerned in legal proceedings, preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, maintaining the authority and independence of the courts, regulating the technical administration or the technical operation of telephony, telegraphy, posts, wireless broadcasting or television, or ensuring fairness and balance in the dissemination of information to the public; or imposes restrictions upon public officers or officers of any  corporate body established on behalf of the public or owned by or on behalf of the Government of
Guyana; imposes restrictions upon any person, institution, body, authority or political party from taking any action or advancing, disseminating or supporting any idea, which may result in racial or ethnic divisions among the people of Guyana.  The constitution also states that freedom of expression in this article does not relate to hate speeches or other expressions, in
whatever form, capable of exciting hostility or ill-will.

Claiming that “poor and powerless” Guyanese were last year dispossessed of their land, government officials allegedly flouted the law and escaped prosecution; Opposition Leader Norton promised that in 2024 the APNU+AFC coalition would forge ahead with defending Guyana’s democracy and constitutional order and the rights and liberties of citizens and communities. He also pledged that the coalition would continue to expose government corruption, discrimination, ineptitude and intensify its demand for a clean voters list and biometrics at the place of poll, and remain vigilant against the squandering of Guyana’s oil wealth. “For now, as the Opposition, on our agenda for 2024, we will stay the course in the fight for a fair, just and equitable Guyana. We will build more pressure on the government to implement cost of living relief measures and to ensure fair and equitable allocation of resources to citizens,” he said.