There is an old saying that remains as relevant today as it has ever been in history: “We are only as strong as our weakest link”. There are many variations of this lingo. One relevant one for Guyana is that our democracy is only as strong as our weakest link. Guyana does not need much research to identify our greatest weakness, our weakest link, our greatest threat to democracy. From its inception, the PNC has always been Guyana’s weakest link and our greatest threat when it comes to our democracy.
There are really no “ands, ifs and buts” about this. While the PNC’s authorship and leading role in rigged elections are well known and well documented in Guyana and well known around the world, rigged elections and overall cheating at elections only represent some of the genes in the PNC’s overall anti-democratic DNA.
Ever since the PNC’s founding-leader tried to cheat Cheddi Jagan out of the leadership of the PPP, post-1953 elections, the PNC has had a continuous anti-democracy trajectory. Unfortunately for Guyana, the PNC’s antidemocracy assault is now more than seven decades long. Rigged elections and their violence-prone protests are only part of the anti-democracy DNA. Every day, through other actions, they are determined to remind Guyana that their own role in Guyana is to grab power at any and all cost.
The PNC makes no bones about their place in Guyana’s continued struggle to ensure democracy prevails. The latest manifestation of their anti-democracy posture is the ongoing swearing in of councillors and appointments of committees for municipalities and NDCs. In the largest of these, the Mayor and City Council of Georgetown, a council that has been plagued for more than 60 years by unaccountability and financial squander, the PNC used its majority to appoint its candidates as Mayor and Deputy Mayor. It appointed as Mayor a person who lost his constituency in the June 12th LGE. Imagine, the people of this man’s constituency rejected him, and yet the PNC used its majority to foist him on the City as Georgetown Mayor.
He was previously Deputy Mayor of Georgetown, and was part of an executive which was infamous for unaccountability. He was part of the City’s executive which has not subjected its accounts for auditing for many years. But during last week, when the councillors were sworn-in, the PNC used its majority to put the Mayor on the Finance Committee of the Council. It also used its majority to appoint five other members on the seven-man committee, leaving only one space for the PPP. Where is the PNC’s commitment to accountability and democracy?
The PPP won almost 45% of the votes in Georgetown, and deserves to represent the people, not just in the overall council, but also in the committees.
In New Amsterdam, where the PNC won 8 of the 14 seats, it not only appointed both the Mayor and Deputy Mayor, but also excluded PPP members from any of the committees. New Amsterdam is another of the municipalities plagued with unaccountability. The Finance Committee is made up exclusively of party members who have been identified with the unaccountable status in New Amsterdam for decades. The talk of commitment to democracy is just trash talk. It is manifested across Guyana in the thirteen municipalities and NDCs they have control of.
The new Mayor of Georgetown, in thanking his colleagues for electing him, called on the political parties to work across the table to ensure they serve the people with optimal effectiveness and efficiency. It was a noble call. But almost in the same breath, the mayor supported his colleagues to lock out the PPP from vital committees in City Council. The mayor, who called for working across the table, insisted that it is the PPP’s fault that it was locked out from committees. In his book, the PPP needed to ask for inclusion. When the PPP nominated persons for committee membership, it asked for inclusion. If the mayor’s call was genuine, he could have implored his colleagues to give a certain number of PPP members a chance, for example, to be part of the Finance Sub-Committee. It is an empty call, and dishonest in declaring your willingness to work across the table while at the same time telling those on the other side you do not belong. It is ingenious and wicked.
The mayor wants to put the past behind, bury the hatchet. He and his PNC colleagues had a chance to show that they want to work as a team for Georgetown and its citizens. The first opportunity to show they are serious about harmonious team work for Georgetown, the mayor himself failed. He is being pilloried not for the past, but for his present action. Georgetown and other municipalities and the NDCs cannot expect the PNC members to show they can help strengthen our democracy and work in the interest of the people.
