GUYANA | Opposition APNU+AFC Chief Scrutineer Charged with 14 counts of fraud

GEORGETOWN, Guyana, December 9, 2022 - In an action that seems blatantly retaliatory, the Guyana Police Force’s Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU), has charged Opposition A Partnership for National Unity+Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) Chief Scrutineer , Carol Smith-Joseph With  14 counts of fraud connected to when she served as a Director of the Mahaica Abary Rice Development Scheme (MARDS) back in 2016. 

Her attorney, Senior Counsel Roysdale Forde, says “There is no clear explanation from the police as to what is the subject matter and what it relates to really; they are just saying that she received funds being the property of MARAD.”

It is alleged that Ms Smith-Joseph committed the offences in May 2016. “The present administration has been in office since 2020 and no attempt was made to lay these allegations until after Ms Joseph commenced proceedings against GECOM,”  says Attorney Nigel Hughes who is also a part of her team.

Mr Hughes said  on the advice of  Counsel, Ms Smith-Joseph declined to give a statement to the police. She was released on self-bail and ordered to return to court on December 16.

She was earlier this week ordered to report to the Guyana Police Force’s Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) on Friday December 9. Mr. Hughes said after they emerged, she was told that she was under arrest.

The APNU+AFC Coalition has linked the police action against Ms Smith-Joseph to her recent High Court challenge against the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM). 

She has sued GECOM  for proceeding with the Local Government Elections (LGE) which is scheduled for March 13, 2023, without the preparation of a proper  voters lists based on the legal requirement  of residency as well as the Local Government Minister Nigel Dharamlall’s reconfiguration of a number of constituency boundaries.

Mr Forde, who is the opposition’s Shadow Attorney General, contended that “we believe that it is a retaliatory act, because the circumstances obviously would have been known to them for many years but they only instituted after the proceedings would have been filed and it led to  catastrophe at GECOM.”

GECOM on Thursday decided to shift the announced December 12, Nomination Day and is now expected to make arrangements to go ahead with a proposal by Chief Elections Officer Vishnu Persaud for the voters lists in each constituency to be brought in line with the legal requirements under the constitution..