Following the early morning arrest and subsequent charging of PPP/C Member of Parliament (MP) and former Minister of Housing, Irfaan Ali, Opposition Leader, Bharrat Jagdeo has expressed concerns of surveillance of his party’s members.
“This is an unbelievable thing,” Jagdeo said this afternoon during a press conference at his Church Street Office. The PPP/C Leader explained that he was informed that members of the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) had wanted to capture Ali before he went to exercise in the morning.
“Now I don’t know if Irfaan Ali leaves that early but I found out that he does go off to exercise so it meant that they [SOCU operatives] must have been watching him; they must have been watching his behaviours and patterns to know to show up there early in the morning.”
According to Jagdeo, he would not put it past the Government to have a unit conducting surveillance on PPP/C members and MPs and he believes that this surveillance could be linked to the No-Confidence Motion is party lodged earlier this month. Calling the Government desperate to hold on to power, he said that he would not put it past the administration to have Opposition MPs locked up to desist them from showing up for the No-Confidence vote.
“So they’re probably watching everyone,” he said. He further said that if the Government can “turn up surreptitiously in the night, they can do anything”.
He said too that he has “just assumed” that the Government is tapping phones. “So I use WhatsApp,” he said, before adding, “And I suggest you do too.”
Meanwhile, Jagdeo has indicated that Ali will remain in his position as Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. He opined that if Opposition MPs were to bow down to every allegation issued by the Government, there would be no one on the opposition’s side of the House in National Assembly. “We would have to take out four or five of our MPs already; that is the plan of APNU.”
