THE PPP CONGRESS AND THE ELECTORAL DEFEAT OF 2011

Guyanese will be able to assess the future of the PPP, and the government it leads, by the way in which it treats with the electoral defeat of 2011 at its upcoming Congress. Defying all rational odds and holding on to a minority government, courtesy of the Burnham constitution, the results of the elections signaled […]

THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE’S REPORT TO THE PPP CONGRESS

The state owned press has been reporting recently that preparations for the PPP Congress are moving ahead. Apart from physical and organizational aspects, there are a number of documents which are prepared for presentation. The most important is the Central Committee’s Report. This lengthy document reviews developments since the last Congress. Areas of examination include […]

THE TRIPARTITE COMMITTEE

A Tripartite Committee, comprising the three political parties represented in the National Assembly, was appointed last year during the Budget controversy and is now revived. There was no agreement in 2012 on anything in relation to the 2012 Budget except for the aborted deal relating to pensions and Linden electricity rates. This unraveled when the […]

‘THE OLD IS DYING AND THE NEW CANNOT BE BORN’

Antonio Gramsci’s statement, meant for a different situation, accurately depicts Guyana’s political condition. He describes this period as ‘the interregnum’ in which ‘a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.’ Our symptoms are: squabbling over the Budget, voting a hospital down, failure of the tripartite talks, the Speaker overruling the Chief Justice, Government’s support for ‘shared […]

BUDGET BLUES

Formal exchanges of letters between the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh, and the Shadow Minister of Finance, Mr. Carl Greenidge, seeking to fix a date for a meeting to discuss the proposed Budget, and the inevitable name calling when the exercise proved unsuccessful, ought to have alerted everyone that no serious discourse will take […]