Category: Letters to the editor

Dear Editor,

During the 2026 Budget debate in the National Assembly last week, Minister Deodat Indar stated that the report into the December 2023 Guyana Defence Force helicopter crash would not be released to the public, on the basis that the aircraft was engaged in a military operation. That assertion raises a discrete legal question: whether, as a matter of international aviation law or Guyana’s domestic law, the Minister’s position is legally justified.

The analysis therefore turns on the legal consequences of that characterisation. It requires consideration of the international framework governing state aircraft, particularly the Chicago Convention, and of the domestic legal regime governing access to official information, including the Constitution of Guyana and the Access to Information Act 2011. The central issue is whether either body of law supports the Minister’s conclusion that the report may not be disclosed.

Internationally, the Chicago Convention distinguishes between civilian aircraft and aircraft engaged in military service. Aircraft in military service are excluded from the Convention’s mandatory civil aviation accident-reporting regime. That exclusion, however, goes to obligation only. It does not prohibit disclosure, nor does it regulate access to information under domestic law.

The constitutional position is governed by Article 146 of the Constitution of Guyana, which protects freedom of expression and includes the freedom to receive information without interference. While that right may be limited in the interests of defence or public safety, any restriction must be reasonably required and capable of justification.

The Access to Information Act 2011 gives effect to that constitutional right. It recognises national security and military operations as grounds for exemption, but it does so on a qualified basis. The Act contemplates redaction and partial disclosure where necessary, not the blanket suppression of an entire report.

Five servicemen lost their lives in the December 2023 crash. Their families continue to seek closure. The helicopter bore civil aviation registration and was not engaged in combat. These factors engage a strong public interest in disclosure of the non-operational findings of the investigation.

A previous Senior Minister publicly committed to the release of the report. If the present position is that disclosure is now unlawful, that proposition must be established in law. Ministerial succession does not alter the legal obligations of the State.

The question is not whether sensitive military information may be protected, but whether the law permits the suppression of an entire investigation report; neither the Chicago Convention nor the Access to Information Act appears to support the Minister’s conclusion.

In my considered opinion, the law allows publication of the report, subject only to such limited and strictly necessary redaction as is required to protect legitimate national security interests. The public interest overwhelmingly favours disclosure.

Sincerely,

Christopher Ram

Dear Editor,

In the course of her presentation on the 2026 Budget as shadow Minister of Labour, WIN’s Ms. Nandranie Singh was interrupted by the Speaker, who purported to correct her. Ms. Singh had pointed out that the largest item shown under the Ministry of Labour was not expenditure controlled by the Ministry but a subvention to the Board of Industrial Training. The interruption was out of order. It is not the Speaker’s role to rebut a member’s argument; that responsibility lies with the Government benches whose estimates are under scrutiny. By intervening in this manner, the Speaker crossed from presiding over debate into participating in it.

The intervention was also ill-informed. Mr. Nadir previously served as Minister of Labour and ought therefore to know that the Board of Industrial Training is a creature of statute (Industrial Training Act Cap. 39:04), not a department of the Ministry. And that a subvention does not make its expenditure ministerial spending.

If Mr. Nadir’s tenure as Minister blurred those distinctions, it is not too late for him, as Speaker, to respect them.

Yours faithfully,

Christopher Ram 

Dear Editor,

A group photograph I appeared in two days ago, following a two-hour session with the new political party, We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) led by an OFAC sanctioned individual has triggered irrational reaction in certain quarters. The most irrational reaction published as a Breaking News alleges that I was paid $50 million “to prepare Budget Debate” which I thought had been done by the finance minister. That allegation is entirely false, reckless, and malicious.

I have not received, nor have I ever sought or accepted, any payment from Mr. Mohamed, from WIN, or from any sanctioned individual or person acting on behalf of such an individual. The post is plainly designed to create mischief by implying that I have breached Guyana’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws. That implication is wicked, malevolent and unfounded.

Guyana operates a system of parliamentary democracy in which citizens participate in national decision-making through their elected representatives in the National Assembly. Following the presentation of the 2026 Budget, I was approached by the Prime Ministerial candidate of WIN, which secured sixteen seats in the National Assembly, and asked whether I would meet with the Party’s elected members to offer general guidance on the Budget Debate and the Estimates process.

I agreed to do so entirely pro bono.

In addition to the publication of a flagship Focus on Budget published for the past 36 years, our accounting firm consistently provides technical guidance on budgetary, fiscal, and governance matters without charge to representatives of almost every major political party in Guyana, across administrations and across the political spectrum. This is neither novel nor partisan; it is part of my longstanding contribution to public discourse.

As a social and economic commentator, I have a vested interest in ensuring that the Budget Debate is informed, robust, and grounded in fact, regardless of which party occupies the Treasury benches. Parliamentary scrutiny of public expenditure is central to democratic accountability, and engagement aimed at improving that scrutiny is both legitimate and necessary. I will always support and participate in making a modest contribution.

For the avoidance of doubt, I expressly invite my bankers and the Financial Intelligence Unit to review my accounts and deposits. I have nothing to hide.

Finally, the allegation collapses under its own absurdity. If I commanded a fee of $50 million for two hours of work, I would not need to be practising at the age of eighty.

I reserve all my legal rights in relation to this matter.

Sincerely,

Christopher Ram

Dear Editor,

I have seen the paid advertisement by Banks DIH Holdings Inc. responding to my letter appearing in the Stabroek News of 12 January 2026 and the Kaieteur News the following day.

My letter addressed strict issues of law and corporate governance. It did not name a single director or officer of the company or member of the group, nor did it make any reference to their personal or professional character. I therefore have no interest in responding to personal attacks: they trouble me not in the least bit.

What disappoints me is that a company which once enjoyed a stellar reputation for propriety and integrity has descended to the level of publicly disclosing matters relating to a shareholder’s private affairs. That is wholly inappropriate and, in my view, unworthy of a public company.

In doing so, the advertisement states that I “sold all my shares” in the company. That statement is false. I did not sell my shares. I transferred them by way of gift to members of my staff and family. I did so because, like the capital market generally, I have no confidence in the direction in which the company is heading.

That correction aside, I have nothing further to add in the public arena. The issues raised in my letter are questions of law. They will be resolved in the proper forum.

Yours faithfully,

Christopher Ram

Dear Editor,

It is deeply disappointing that Dr. Ashni Singh, the de facto Minister of Finance, failed in his 2025 mid-year report to account for the much-publicised $10 billion “injection” into the National Insurance Scheme. Though repeatedly touted by the President and Dr. Singh, no report – let alone an audited statement – has been produced to show what was paid or how contributors’ rights were affected. This was all political theatre, not transparency, not governance.

As minister responsible for the NIS, Dr. Singh’s record is troubling. Annual NIS reports are years overdue, denying Parliament and the public meaningful oversight. For decades, actuarial recommendations to restore the Scheme’s viability have been ignored. Its survival has depended largely on fortuitous contributions from temporary oil and gas workers – a matter of chance, not competent management.

It also bears recalling that Dr. Singh presided over the Ministry of Finance when the Scheme suffered heavy investment losses following the collapse of Clico, in a sector over which he exercised oversight. That failure continues to haunt the NIS. And in fifteen years as minister responsible for the NIS, not a single amending law has been introduced to modernise this Burnham-era legislation.

Against this background, the one-off cash grant is misleading, coercive and unjust. No new funds are injected; the State merely reimburses payments made. Contributors are required to surrender legal claims arising from disputed contributions – many of which exist only because of chronic mismanagement and poor record-keeping. In effect, the Government has used a cheap avenue to settle its moral and legal obligations.

The Scheme, encouraged by the Government, intimidates claimants by way of appeals – as in the case of the carpenter, and another (an octogenarian) who must wait for his appeal to be heard by a vacant internal tribunal awaiting an appointment, yes by the Minister of Finance.

This week I learnt of another contribution saga, this time of a retired teacher who over a period of several years had her contributions adjusted from 621 to 674 and then to 721, still short of 750, the minimum to qualify for a pension. The NIS likes to placate such persons by assuring them that some persons are short by one contribution!

Elderly claimants, facing ill health and delay, are abandoning valuable legal rights for the one-off grant. This makes the NIS happy, no more hard work, thorough investigations and follow-up with employers, or having their inadequacies pronounced on by the courts in a public forum.

In practice, contributors are forced to trade pension rights worth millions for a one-off payment of $650,000, while bearing the near-impossible burden of proving decades-old employment and contributions.

This injustice is compounded by a Board shaped through ministerial appointments, leaving contributors without meaningful representation.

Until audited figures are published, contributors’ rights clarified, and genuine reform undertaken, the NIS will continue to operate behind a façade of action. Responsibility now rests squarely with Dr. Ashni Singh. Continued inaction is both glaring and inhumane.

Yours faithfully,

Christopher Ram