Georgetown: After being appointed the Chief Executive Officer of the National COVID-19 Task Force recently, Joseph Harmon, was on Saturday relieved of his position as Director General at the Ministry of the Presidency.
Over a week ago, the Ministry of the Presidency was forced to distance President David Granger and the Government from the hiring of a US lobbying firm JJ&B LLC to make representation on the government’s behalf with US officials in the aftermath of elections fraud.
However, this was done without the consent of President Granger. The President then made it clear that Government had no part in the hiring the lobbying firm, although Harmon was listed as the contact person on the contract for the Guyana Government.
Further, the President also noted that taxpayers’ monies was not used for the hiring of the lobbying firm.
Harmon had said, “…we believe as a Government, it was our duty, our responsibility to ensure that our narrative, the facts as they occurred, should be placed there [on the international stage]. We felt it was necessary to have a company that has that access to be able to put out our side.”
According to a copy of the public filings made by LL&B, LLC with the US authorities, the contract was inked with the Government of Guyana, represented by the Director General of the Ministry of the Presidency.
The listed address is the Ministry of the Presidency at Shiv Chanderpaul Drive, not any address affiliated with the coalition A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance for Change (APNU/AFC).
In the document filed with the US Department of Justice, which was received by the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) Unit of the United States National Security Division on March 31, 2020, the Guyana Government was named the ‘foreign principal’; the Ministry of the Presidency was listed as the agency that is being represented by the lobbyist firm, and Harmon was named as the official with whom the company engages.
The Ministry further denied that the President is a citizen of the United States of America “as is being suggested by way of documents submitted to the United States Department of Justice and published in the press.”
Meanwhile, the Ministry of the Presidency issued the following statement below on Saturday:
The Ministry of the Presidency wishes to clarify that Mr. Joseph Harmon is no longer performing the functions of Director General of the Ministry of the Presidency.
President David Granger has appointed Mr. Harmon Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the National Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Task Force (NCTF).
The President made this announcement on Friday. As CEO, Mr. Harmon under the general or specific directions of the Chairman of the NCTF is to establish a permanent National Task Force secretariat; assign permanent staff to manage the national campaign; create preventive measures against the disease to safeguard citizens’ health and collaborate with regional task forces and stakeholders to safeguard citizens’ health.
The CEO is responsible, under the direction of the Chair, for directing the NCTF operations and restarting interrupted activities; all important logistics measures necessary to prevent the disease from spreading further, directing rapid responses to unexpected and emergency incidents; developing short-term plans for disease prevention and safety of the people and communicating directly with agencies, ministries, regional task force, agencies and stakeholders.
The CEO is responsible also for disseminating accurate information with regard to COVID-19 to the public.
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