Dear Editor,
I wish to reply to Mr Fizul Bacchus’s letter published is the Stabroek News on Thursday, July 21, captioned ‘Articles on proceedings of Guyana Cricket Board AGM misleading.’
I am advised that the Berbice Cricket Board is engaging their lawyers and my respect for Mr Foster and his executives is tremendous, so I would not address the inaccuracies authored in Mr Bacchus’s letter that could hoodwink the public, but to address what the writer said pertaining to my objection to the video recording. He said: “this AGM was video-recorded in total, despite strenuous objections from Mr Bissoondyal Singh, and can be used in a court of law. Mr Singh exposed his inconsistency when he objected to the taping of this meeting; but on the other hand when he was sitting as the President of the DCB stoutly defended his decision to tape the Demerara Board AGM in January, 2010, claiming that all meetings should be recorded to get an accurate reflection of the proceedings. Persons would again be able to witness the antics and behaviour of this presidential candidate at meetings.”
I did object to the meeting being recorded because it was the same person who recorded the Demerara Board meeting for a particular group, and that recording was shown several times on CNS 6. However there is another video-recording of that same meeting. If you view the other recording then you would see technology at its best (the cutting, pasting editing, etc), while the final product paints a different picture, but because the matter is attracting the attention of the court we could not air that recording. It is for this reason I objected to this special camera, but why were the media not allowed to do the recording? I wanted all the cameras/media, etc, in the meeting because I wanted the public to see exactly what transpired. As a matter of fact I invited all the journalists and they were asked to leave, why?
With regards to my antics and behaviour, I have no apologies. The Guyana Cricket Board is a national institution and given what transpired there worse than my behaviour was needed to stop what was being foisted upon the Guyanese cricket-loving public. There was no quorum and when I objected, Mr Chetram Singh said that he is the chairman and that he can ask me to leave. Could you imagine that? I told him bluntly that I was not leaving. It was hushed whilst the Chairman went on as if it was business as usual, but I felt a sense of emptiness and frustration that the Guyana Cricket Board was being hijacked in my presence and there was nothing I could have done but to let Mr Ramsey Ali know (he was sitting next to me) that it was the nastiest thing I had ever seen. With the absence of the media and a single video-recording, the hijacking seemed well planned. The healthiest thing to do was laugh periodically. Again, I have no apologies for what Mr. Bacchus perceived to be “antics and behaviour by the presidential candidate.”
Yours faithfully,
Bissoondyal Singh
