Panday: I am innocent of the charge

AFTER spending eight nights in jail, Opposition Leader Basdeo Panday calmly walked out of the Maximum Security Prison in Arouca yesterday afternoon. He heeded the advice of a delegation from the Inter-Religious Organi-sation (IRO) hours earlier that he should take bail and fight his battles outside the prison walls. The bearded politician walked to freedom at 4.45 pm followed by his wife Oma, daughter Mikela, his political colleagues and attorneys. Panday, 72, chose to stay in jail when he first made his court appearance on May 31, charged with corruptly receiving ?25,000 from businessman Ish Galbaransingh and former government minister Carlos John.

When he reappeared in court on Tuesday, Panday’s bail was reduced from $750,000 to $650,000, but the former Prime Minister chose to return to jail. However, after the visit of the IRO delegation, Panday decided to take bail and everything was in train for the release. There were two options. Panday could have been brought to the Port-of-Spain State Prison to have his bail taken, or the officials of the Magistracy could have gone to the Arouca Prison and arranged bail for Panday. It was decided that the easier method was assembling at Arouca for the taking of the bail. Panday’s bail was taken by Dr Tim Gopeesingh and his wife Kamini, and supervised by Justice of the Peace Ackbar Khan.

Apart from attorney Prakash Ramadhar, several of Panday’s colleagues turned up, including Wade Mark, Ganga Singh, Chandresh Sharma, Chaguanas Mayor Suruj Rambachan, and party financier Jack Warner. After leaving prison, Panday told his handful of supporters, “I am innocent of the charge. It is malicious, it is vindictive. They have no evidence of it. I want to give you that assurance that you will feel in your heart that you are here in support of someone who is innocent. “One of the reasons I stayed in prison was to prove to myself that I was capable of enduring any kind of pressure the PNM wants to inflict on me.

I can take anything they can dish out, I hope they can take what I can dish out.” Panday said he was feeling fine and was hoping to attend the sitting of Parliament yesterday, but his release took too long. Asked what was the first thing he will do when he reaches home, Panday said, “if I tell you, you would not be able to print it.” Panday said he considered and respected the advice of the IRO, which was why he decided to end his prison days. Asked if he was going to keep the beard which he grew in prison, the Opposition Leader said he would wait on reaction.

He did much reading while in jail and found out that a wrist watch was an oppressor. “It tells you when you have to wake up, when you have to bathe and when you have to go to sleep. In prison, I had no watch, I was free of the watch of time.” Panday said when he left for England in 1957, that was the last time he had to bathe with cold water. “In prison, I had to return to that, but I feel spiritually stronger and ready to resume my fight against all forms of discrimination and the crime problem.”