Entering… new (money) politics

Your Eyewitness sees – with some trepidation! – our newfound oil wealth promising to transform everything – including, evidently, the cost of telling politicians what they wanna hear!! In the old days, all a political party needed were organisers, polling agents, somebody with a loudspeaker – and an uncle who knew which houses needed another visit!! In our sophisticated petroleum future, however, we’re told we need a communications strategist, a brand architect, a digital engagement specialist and a consultant to explain why they must all be paid in US dollars!!
Hey!! We’re moving up in the world innit?? So even our propaganda gotta do it like they do it up north!! But THEIR “modern” way comes with a logic based on if parties raise money to win elections, consultants make money from the process!! Victory’s desirable for the politicos – invoicing’s essential to the consultants!! The business model is simple – win, and the consultant’s BRILLIANT strategy deserves an expanded contract. Lose?? Oh well the electorate proved unexpectedly complex, requiring a comprehensive review – under another contract!! Heads, consultants collect; tails, they also collect!!
Just imagine the possibilities – politician like Sanction Man who can’t persuade the village idiot, can now purchase a “national persuasion framework” and whup the PNC!! Rumour is packaged as “opposition research”; cuss-out becomes “rapid response”; a photograph of a Sanction Man handing over a house purchased with unpaid taxes becomes “leadership visibility”!! And a yardful of loyal Scrapes applauding their leader, becomes evidence of “organic momentum – with the invoice, unlike the momentum, entirely real!!
Now don’t get your Eyewitness wrong – there’s useful work for competent advisers since campaigns need organisation, research and clear communication!! But unless you’re rolling in smuggling loot, a party should become suspicious when every political problem conveniently requires another service – sold by the people diagnosing it!! If young people are alienated, buy digital outreach; if communities feel neglected, buy perception management; if the leader’s a liar, refresh the brand!! What about changing the behaviour causing the problem?? Naaah!! That ain’t sufficiently strategic!!
Unless a candidate can’t answer straightforward questions without a prompt – like you know who!! – parties shouldn’t pay specialists to teach them more expensive ways of avoiding the answers!! Normal parties should therefore disclose who advises them, who pays, and what services are being purchased!! And anyone promising scientific precision in winning Guyanese votes should first demonstrate an ability to understand a bottom-house argument without commissioning a focus group!! Oil must surely improve our democracy beyond giving the old political nonsense a new logo. Otherwise, when the new election rolls around – and Sanction Man’s cooling his heels in a Miami penitentiary – the consultants gonna announce they’ve achieved a historic breakthrough!!
Their payment has cleared!!

… development
When your Eyewitness was in school – eons ago!! – one of the first thing the economics teacher pointed out was the difference between “growth” and “development”. Growth was about the economy – which includes building bridges, highways, factories and so on. And alphabet soup concoctions like GNP and GDP and so on describe it. On the other hand, development refers to people! So all that growth – which could be negative, mind you, like during the Burnham years! – might take some time to improve people’s lives!!
As such, development ain’t like instant coffee where you just heat up the water, throw in the coffee, stir and bingo!! So the government’s doing itself a disservice by insisting we’re experiencing “development” – rather than pointing out they’re providing opportunities for that with growth!! Like with all the training, loan facilities, new land development etc, where we the people gotta get involved for development!!
So lets tell it like it is – we gotta bear strain with growth but better (development) days are comin’!!

…twilight zone
All of the players charged criminally for the 2020 rigging attempt have chosen to produce the COIs they based their claims on.
What about the power of truth to set us free?? Well, evidently not if it convicts!!