Social media infuencer faces deportation to Guyana

A Brooklyn-based Guyanese social media activist who made daily life a living hell for top government and private sector officials by exposing horror stories of corruption now faces deportation after she was last week plucked from her home by ICE agents and spirited to a holding center in Louisiana where she awaits her fate.

Melissa Atwell-Holder, who traded on social media as “Melly Mell” served up dozens of stories and exposes about government corruption in Guyana for months, basically earning the title as an enemy of the state. She laid bare a mix of corruption tales intertwined with links between ministers and other high officials with their family members and “side chics” alleging that millions in contracts were being funneled through these cronies as fronts for the ruling elite.

She dared the government in daily exchanges to extradite her to Guyana to face cyber bullying and other charges. She even accused Attorney General Anil Nandlall of being one of her insider confidential contacts, alleging that he had used her to secretly dump tons of political dirt on colleagues and others with whom he is feuding, charges he has vehemently denied. She had claimed that he was a very useful contact before an apparent disagreement.

Now, she is engaged in a fight to both remain in the US where she married a US citizen several years ago and to protect herself if she is in fact deported back home in the coming weeks.

A master hearing for her is scheduled in Louisiana on March 28th where additional details of why she was snatched from her home are expected to be released. Her attorneys say they also plan to make an application for bail.

Atwell had become such a household name in Guyana that thousands of Guyanese, including government and opposition officials, had logged on to her Facebook page daily and had tuned into her live FB chats detailing a plethora of alleged corruption acts and tales of high officials winning and dining ‘kept women.’

Opposition parties have accused authorities of plotting her arrest by loading up American officials with alleged acts of criminality, including extortion and cyber bullying. AG Nandlall says no such thing occurred. He even mocked an opposition rally in Georgetown this week in support of her saying the US government acted alone in arresting and detaining her.

“Lo and behold, a group of persons in Guyana is protesting in Guyana, presumably based upon the utterances I am hearing, protesting the government of Guyana and calling for the release of this person. And for the avoidance of doubt, the government of Guyana did not arrest Melissa Atwell. The government of Guyana is not detaining Melissa Atwell, from all the information that is available, it is the US government that has arrested and is detaining Melissa Atwell,” Nandlall said on a social media posting.