7th of June, 2022. Georgetown, Guyana, South America. GSA News
Last updated: June 7, 2022 at 20:11 pm
Leader of the opposition APNU/AFC, Aubrey Norton, today seemed irate when he appeared in a live Facebook broadcast and said that the president bullied him into shaking his hand. Norton alleged that he was “in his corner” when the president showed up “with a set of cameras” and attempted to shake his hand. He said he refused, but President Ali bullied him into a handshake – an act which seems to have caused Norton some amount of emotional distress.
I wasn’t even looking in his direction. And he turned to me…apparently he had his hand outstretched…and he turned to me and asked me if I don’t want to shake his hand and I said “no.” He then proceeded to…what I consider to be (bullyism)…and we ended up shaking hands.
Aubrey Norton – 7th of June, 2022
Norton further expressed that he did not want to shake Ali’s hand because all is not well with the country. He says he does not want to give the public the wrong impression that its business as usual in Guyana when it is not. He alleged that the country’s financial resources are being used to enrich a handful of PPP/C elites, and that the newfound oil wealth is not trickling down to the masses. In this context, he pointed out that cost of living has increased significantly across the country.
Norton further accused Ali of oppressing persons or groups of persons who are perceived to be within the APNU/AFC support base.
But I want to make it clear that, first of all, I cannot treat this as business as usual. You have a situation in Guyana where the president continues to dismiss workers from all across the public sector. Recently, two GPL workers complained that they were arbitrarily dismissed. A lot of those who are being dismissed are essentially Afro-Guyanese, and Indo-Guyanese and Amerindians whom they perceive to be APNU/AFC. We are seeing signs in Guyana, if not full blown, that they are operating in a dictatorial way.
