The joint opposition parties have called on Cabinet Secretary Dr. Roger Luncheon and the Guyana Agricultural Workers’ Union (GAWU) to “give their unstinted support” to the demand for an international commission of inquiry, saying that it would offer answers to the concerns being raised by both the government spokesman and the union. The joint opposition parties, the PNCR, AFC, GAP, NFA, WPA and the Unity Party, referred to the statement by Luncheon which questioned their sincerity in meeting with civil society to press for the inquiry last week.

Luncheon, in his capacity as government spokesman, had declared that any discussion at the forum should include the parties’ “role in tragedies” in Guyana, in the period between 2001 and 2008.  He accused both the PNCR and the AFC of supporting the Buxton gang during this period, but leaders of both parties have since strongly denied this. Meanwhile, last week GAWU expressed concern about testimony in a New York courtroom that members of the army in 2005 moved the bodies of missing sugar workers from the front of Buxton to the backlands and it raised the question as to whether those who have been named shouldn’t be made to provide a response. Testimony about missing sugar workers was provided by former Roger Khan attorney Robert Simels who is on trial in a New York court for witness tampering.

Among other things he testified that senior army officials instructed the removal of the bodies of the sugar workers to the back of Buxton.

In a press statement, the joint opposition parties said that they have noted the statement by Luncheon as well as the concerns ex-pressed by GAWU about testimony emerging from the Simels trial that members of the GDF in 2005 moved the bodies of the missing sugar workers from the front of the village to the backlands.

“It is the considered view of the Joint Opposition Parties that both the accusations of Dr. Luncheon and concerns of GAWU can best be answered in the course of the International Commis-sion of Inquiry that should leave no stone unturned in the search for truth and justice,” the parties stated.

The parties said too that if Dr. Luncheon is sincere in his accusations and GAWU in their concerns, they would support the demand for the inquiry.

The opposition parties also noted that Private Sector Commission Chairman Gerry Gouveia, who was present at the forum with civil society, declined an invitation by the moderator Christopher Ram to address the audience. Gouveia was named as a person who Simels interviewed during his visits here.