CORRUPTION – THE TIME HAS COME TO TAKE ACTION


I wrote and spoke about the issue of corruption in Guyana last year. This issue can no longer be ignored by the Government. Last Sunday’s newspapers carried almost a dozen stories in which allegations of corruption featured. Many of them were exaggerated, frivolous or speculative. But several of them are serious enough to compel the Government to take note. Corruption and allegations of corruption are not going to disappear if we do nothing else other than call for proof, claim that we now have regular reports from the Auditor General, or that we declare our assets to the Integrity Commission while the Opposition members do not. The time has come to take action.

Like many developing countries Guyana has not been able to contain corruption. Since 1992, spending, especially on infrastructure and procurement, has multiplied to levels that we could not have imagined. In any country, much less one with historically weak systems like Guyana, and a sharply divided and adversarial political system, it is not surprising that actual corruption and allegations of corruption are so rife. Admitting that corruption exists ought not an to be issue. It does exist and that cannot be denied. The challenge for the Government is to understand that the opposition is going to make the most politically of corruption and allegations of corruption and to recognize that the answer is to do something about it, not beat its breast about what it has done, which only exposes the inadequacy of its efforts.

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GUYANA ELECTION RESULTS – AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH


The election results were not anticipated even though some felt that the Party would face new challenges at the elections. Now for the first time the Party holds a minority of seats in the National Assembly.

Under the relevant provisions of the Constitution, designed by Burnham and imposed upon Guyana, we are entitled to the Presidency and the President has the power to appoint a government. We chose the course of a minority government rather than inviting one or both opposition parties to join us in a coalition.

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FLEXING MAJORITARIAN MUSCLE


Mr. Carl Greenidge outlined the Opposition’s pre-conceived views on the Supplementary Estimates (‘Estimates’) in an interview in the KN published on Thursday, February 16, just before their consideration by the National Assembly on the afternoon of that day. With his eye on the struggle for the leadership of the PNCR, words like “illegality” and “police action,” and threats to surcharge delinquent officials, flowed liberally against the Government and with reckless unconcern that a consideration of the Estimates do not give rise to such possibilities. Worse, these premature conclusions preceded consideration of the Estimates.

This is the first opportunity which the Opposition has had to flex it majoritarian muscle. And obviously it could not allow the moment to pass. After all, its constituency is looking on and anticipating fire and brimstone, as promised, over issues which the Opposition has made much about during the election campaign – financial mismanagement and corruption. The test of whether it failed or succeeded can be judged by the fact that the Opposition supported the first Paper, except two items, and merely caused the deferment of the second.

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NATIONAL UNITY – HAS THE TIME ARRIVED?


The PPP started life as a political party which consciously embraced all strata of the society. The most important, immediate, objective was the unity of the major races of the main social groups, the working and middle classes, including intellectuals and professionals. At this early time, 1950, the founders of the PPP understood that its eventual goals, independence and socialism, and more immediate goal of universal adult suffrage, could not be achieved with a divided society and without a mass based party.

The wave of euphoria after universal adult suffrage, and then the general elections, were won disguised the deep fissures which then existed in our society. These types of divisions were not new. They first existed between the slave owners and slaves, then the Portuguese and Africans and later between the Africans and Indians. The foundation of these differences was the existence of poverty and the ensuing competition for scarce resources. Of course there were other reasons, much of which have been revealed in the debates since that time and more recently. But the PPP’s ideological posture at that time suggested the primacy of economic determinants, which in its view still plays the leading role in keeping these divisions active .

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EXPOSED – ATTEMPTING TO SNATCH BREAD FROM THE TABLE


According to press reports Mr. Khemraj Ramjattan, Chairman of the Alliance For Change and the leader of its parliamentary contingent, has indicated that the AFC intends to vote for the reduction of allocations to various agencies. One objective is to reduce the number of contact employees. The total sum being cut amounts to $3.8B.

To fully appreciate the full magnitude of the cuts the astonishing details need to be set out. Under the Ministry of Tourism, Industry and Commerce the following cuts are being proposed: the National Bureau of Standards from $119M to $62M, the Guyana National Conference Centre from $12M to $3M, Tourism Development from $5.3M to $3M, the Consumer Protection Commission from $91M to $31M, the Competitiveness Programme from $235M to $220M, and Industrial Development from $50M to $25M.

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