Prime Minister Gaston Browne has sought to distance his administration from a Cabinet minister, amid claims of the person being accused of rape.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I\u2019ll say at this point, I have not been able to verify the veracity of the claim, but if indeed it\u2019s a serious issue and it\u2019s before the Crime Unit, then clearly, the Minister involved knows exactly what to do,\u201d Prime Minister Browne said on his weekend radio programme.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Minister would be aware of the governance framework of my administration. Where you have such allegations and there is an active investigation, then the minister has no other option but to resign, pending the result of the investigation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is standard governance practice. So I just want to make that abundantly clear that that is my position on that matter. Clearly I do not have the details and I\u2019m not in a position to say anything further on the matter,\u201d Browne told radio listeners.<\/p>\n
The police have not made any public statement on the issue, but on Monday, the online publication, Antigua News Room (ANR) reported that it \u201ccan now confirm that the member of Prime Minister Gaston Browne\u2019s Cabinet who has been accused of rape is likely to be picked up by members of the Crime Unit today.<\/p>\n
\u201cANR can also confirm that the report was filed by a woman. The document is eight pages long,\u201d it said, adding that the police want to question the minister about the allegations.<\/p>\n
Today is a public holiday here as Antigua and Barbuda celebrates its 39th anniversary of political independence from Britain.<\/p>\n
CMC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Prime Minister Gaston Browne has sought to distance his administration from a Cabinet minister, amid claims of the person being accused of rape. \u201cWhat I\u2019ll say at this point, I have not been able to verify the veracity of the claim, but if indeed it\u2019s a serious issue and it\u2019s before the Crime Unit, then<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":17224,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7,1,2,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","category-mainstory","category-news","category-regional-and-international-news"],"yoast_head":"\n