Dead bandit Gopaul Chowtie was a known heckler at public meetings of the Rise, Organise and Rebuild Guyana (ROAR) movement, according to organising secretary, Roy Singh.
Chowtie was also said to have antagonised other parties which held meetings in communities that are strongholds of the ruling PPP/C, says Singh.
Chowtie was killed by police after he and another man committed a robbery at Success, on the East Coast of Demerara a few weeks ago. The police recovered firearms and ammunition, including an AK-47 rifle.
Meanwhile, Leader of ROAR, Ravi Dev, in a letter published in this newspaper yesterday, remembered that Chowtie and other men would show up at several of ROAR's rallies to take notes and to intimidate the crowd.
In 2002, ROAR held a rally about the crime situation at Lusignan, East Coast Demerara. Chowtie and his group were there and during the rally they heckled the ROAR leader and made numerous derogatory remarks about the party and its supporters.
"It was a usual thing for [Chowtie]. It seemed as if he used to target Dev because wherever Dev went to speak Chowtie was always there," according to Singh, who said it was believed that he was carrying out party instructions.
Dev also wrote that one of Chowtie's associates had stabbed a ROAR organiser in Bath and was hidden by his (Chowtie's) party while the police were looking for him. Another, who is now the PPP's national organiser burnt ROAR's banner in full view of police and was released within hours upon the intervention of now expelled PPP executive Khemraj Ramjattan. Dev claimed the police ranks who responded were reprimanded.
Dev also described Chowtie as an "enforcer" for the PPP and said he was sent to Russia on a PPP scholarship where he received military training. The PPP has neither confirmed nor denied that Chowtie was the beneficiary of a party scholarship.
Singh said that ROAR was well aware of Chowtie's political activities but unaware of his criminal past. He noted that prior to his death Chowtie spent most of his time on the Essequibo Coast, where he was closely linked to the PPP's Essequibo group.
This group had wanted to take up burial arrangements for him but was dissuaded from it and a New York-based group financed the cremation.
PPP General Secretary Donald Ramotar has maintained that Chowtie was not a member of the party after 1989, when he said there was a mutual separation.
Ex-PPP member Ramjattan has denied this saying Chowtie was tied to the party until the time of his death.
On October 12, 1999, Fisheries, Crops and Livestock Minister Satyadeow Sawh commissioned Chowtie's aquaculture farm at Western Hog Island.
Sawh in his speech lauded Chowtie as a pioneer. The enterprise was worth some $9M and covered 30 acres.
Stabroek News was told that Chowtie had landed in debt when he took a loan and could not repay it. The bank was trying to foreclose on him when a prominent government minister intervened.
Asked about Chowtie's family ties, Stabroek News was told that the dead man's wife who lives on the Essequibo Coast said she did not see him regularly.
In fact it was after several weeks and sometimes months that Chowtie would travel up to Parika where he would drop off money for his children and leave.
Reports are that Chowtie spent most of his time prior to his death on the East Coast. He was said to have had many friends most of whom were party workers and he was seen as the leader of the group.