…govt popularity test
Prezzie just made a quite interest suggestion: to wit, Local Government elections in 2018 is gonna be a test of his government’s popularity. There was a time when the PNC were serious about Local Government – but that statement confirms those days are looong gone. Their seriousness was signalled back then by their insistence that political parties at the centre shouldn’t contest these elections, since that would simply transfer the imperatives that drive national politics down to the local level.
So, rather than using Local Government to give autonomy to local people, by having them launch new groupings to contest the elections to deal with their local issues on their merit, we now have the election as a straw poll on the government’s popularity!
But we know, to our cost, that political popularity in Guyana has almost nothing to do with effectiveness, and everything to do with ethnicity. Imagine, when asked why folks at the local level would give the APNU/AFC combine their votes, the best he could offer was they were “proud of having their own towns” and the “green state”!! Really? What exactly has been done to improve, say, Anna Regina — which went to the PPP the last time — to encourage them to change their votes?
But Prezzie probably has in mind places like Georgetown and Bartica, and is expecting an ethnic repeat. But what’s the point? Will he be proud that, for example, Georgetown once again will return Patricia Chase Green and her Gang of Four at the helm of City Hall? What about Local Government freeing Georgetown from corrupt officials? Ooops! That’s only the PPP! What about Georgetowners being captains of their fate and masters of their destiny and all that? But Prezzie will insist that Chase Green — PNC Executive — heads the PNC slate in G/town.
But is that a test of “popularity,” or a test of ethnic loyalties?? We’re going to have a repeat of Bartica in 2016, when Raphael Trotman — putatively from the AFC, as he is again – revealed “the prodigal son has returned home”. Prezzie was more subtle than Amna Ally, who openly called for Barticians not to “split the vote”. He advised, “If we do not stay united, somebody is going to ride a Trojan Horse into this town. A Trojan Horse; they want you to think it is a gift, but the gift is in unity.” But it was the same race card, no?
If this Government’s serious about Local Government, there would’ve been a Local Government Commission in place by now.
Not the foot-dragging by Bulkan, which symbolises the crippling of Local Government and autonomy.
It’s a shad, shad situation.
…contradiction
Prezzie, in defending his government’s electoral popularity, also said: “I want people to accept the notion that the coalition, as a module of inclusionary democracy, is good for Guyana.” Imagine that! Just after the WPA sat across from him to complain they weren’t being “consulted” on matters of Governance!! But, as with the Local Government comment, this statement is revealing about how he sees “inclusionary” government.
And it reveals that the PPP knew what they were talking about when they said they didn’t trust the early talk from the PNC about the idea of “inclusionary government”. What kind of “inclusion” is it when you appoint a man from a party as a Minister but don’t even discuss the matter with the party? As your Eyewitness said earlier, this isn’t “inclusion,” but “buy out”!!
Where’s the “inclusion,” when even the explicitly negotiated Cummingsburg Accord’s been breached so many times it’s not even referred to nowadays.
Even by the fella who got Larwah!
…floods
Ignoring history, the PPP were accused that it was their neglect of Buxton that led to flooding there. So, what’s the story now under this PNC-led govt?
Fact is, while the entire coastland’s a depression between the “backdam” and the “sea wall”, sadly, Buxton’s in a trench.
