Call for a total boycott, non-cooperation demands unflinching support

Dear Editor,
Accepted practice in public policy informs legitimate expectations by our societies. Legal luminaries will be much more expansive on this issue, as it has always been part of key considerations to giving or making judgment in the courts of law. The layman who expects transparency, however, correctly sees variances from expected practices as outright wrongs and also bullish dictatorial impositions, particularly when it comes from one wielding power.
The deceptive diversion from the Carter formula by President David Granger is indeed a variance from the accepted, approved and adopted practice for selecting a chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM). Granger’s unilateral, unlawful, unconstitutional selection and appointment of Retired Justice James Patterson to the position of Chairman is a most poisonous contaminant of our fledgling democracy and ultimate power of our people.
The recent public uproar on the issue is more than justified as we are moving with haste to a point where the desperate trampling on our democracy must be condemned forcefully by all citizens and fair-minded observers. It is welcoming that many voices have spoken out and in particular, that there is recognition of the significant contentious wrongs by transparency bodies and also on the international front. In this respect, the recent comments on the issue being resolved by the court from the British High Commissioner speak volumes.
Mr Granger’s assault on our freedoms sets a framework for significant civil unrest and disturbances as citizens react to this threat. The situation exemplifies a total disrespect for the constitutional office of the Leader of the Opposition; and is an affront to all decent-minded citizens. It also leads to a most wicked domination of the elections mechanism.
Our country must never be taken back to the curse of the lost decades under the People’s National Congress (PNC), which held us undeveloped and enslaved as a nation. It should and must be forcefully resisted! The call for a total boycott, civil resistance and non-cooperation demands unflinching support. It is imperative that all forces are mobilised, sensitised and be ‘gelled’ together for the strongest economic, social and political non-cooperation, in a new struggle to uphold our democracy, which has been spat upon in our country. Never before in this country have we witnessed such a rejection of any political decision.
People of all walks of life, at home and in the Diaspora, and even diplomats have complained bitterly, as the intent and machinery to ‘rig’ the next elections become more visible. There is now an eerie and uneasy tension emerging in many communities, which certainly provides the opportunity for people to have thorough discussions on the matter. The feedback is that they are vehemently opposed to the actions of Granger and the APNU/AFC coalition Government.
Although the President praised his appointee to the GECOM Chair as being competent and a man of immense experience in the legal field, very little is known about Mr Granger’s choice other than he is really an affiliate of the old PNC vanguard. Notwithstanding, his recent contracted position as a government advisor to the Attorney General (AG) is strongly conflicting as it depicts a situation of ‘who pays the piper, calls the tune’. At its best, this situation must be described as woefully sadistic!
The bitter pills presented by Mr Patterson that he is apolitical is obviously untruthful. His fluff and bluff about not been in politics, because he doesn’t have the stamina, seek to misguide. But it is indeed one way to confirm from the mouth of the appointed Chairman himself that he would be significantly challenged to perform the rigorous tasks of the Chairman of GECOM.
The President’s unilateral approach in appointing 84-year-old Patterson as Chairman of GECOM comes at the exclusion and discredit of 18 persons identified from the broad consultative process.
The search became one through which the President himself practically directed and manipulated the criteria. Clearly, many of the names on the three lists provided by the Leader of the Opposition meet Mr Granger’s twisted adumbrations. Yet, his barefaced actions turned out to be devoid of any decency, and confirming of the most suspicious intent to further cultivate divisive politics, given the track record of his political party.
Mr Patterson’s integrity to be non-partisan at GECOM is highly questionable, because he was serving as an adviser to the AG. Are we to accept that Mr Granger’s legal luminary is ‘fit and proper’ when he advised a man who has to be tutored by Mr Anil Nandlall on every occasion that the AG presents a case, either in court or in Parliament?
The situation begs questions regarding what will Mr Patterson do at GECOM, if he was not capable of properly advising the AG. Further, his role as an advisor of the AG meant that he had to be exposed to making and giving advice on legal political decisions which discredits him as a neutral person politically. So there goes his cover as apolitical as he claimed to be.
Mr Granger’s failure to provide reasons for rendering the 18 persons, who were initially recommended through the consultative process, is non-transparent, stinks of suspicion and must be rejected in the interest of all Guyana. The AFC as part of the coalition is equally culpable. It is of note that the Guyana Bar Association has already sent its warning to the President to explain why the 18 nominees were not fit and proper; the nominees from the three lists that were submitted by the Opposition Leader should follow suit.

Yours sincerely,
Neil Kumar