…on AFC’s leadership betrayal
At an extraordinary meeting of the City Council – moved by the suspension of their Standing Orders – the Mayoress was livid. “Look what you have done!!!” she shrieked at the Deputy Mayor Sherod Duncan, her face was contorted with rage. Indeed… look what he’s done.
Duncan had been the AFC’s candidate for Mayor and, even though his party was in Coalition at the Central Government – he ran on a separate AFC ticket. He lost badly in that race – along with the independents like Benschop – to the PNC’s Georgetown machine; under whose tent most of the faithful had returned. But he won his seat and was awarded the Deputy Mayorship in a concession to the Coalition at the higher level, Duncan was expected to toe the line like his “leaders” Nagamootoo and Ramjattan.
And that he didn’t is the reason for the Mayoress, her PNC Gang of Four at City Hall and their handlers in Central Government, shrieking and pulling out their hair! If one wants to be objective about it – Duncan didn’t do much: he just kept pointing out the Gang of Four for not disclosing the terms of the Meter Contract to the rest of the City Council – much less have it debated.
But in the scheme of how things are done in (political) Guyana, it was like pulling a little bit of loose thread on a sleeve and eventually having the entire garment fall apart. Leaving the wearer stark naked! And how are things done in (political) Guyana? Well, we have the party leaders of the AFC who: guaranteed” in the Coalition that they were negotiating with the PNC-led APNU, they would have the autonomy and have the power to speak their piece. Ironically, they announced their Cummingsburg Accord two “Valentine Days” ago.
So here you have the leaders of the party who’d “guaranteed” autonomy in the black and white Cummingsburg Accord – along with a mechanism for settling disputes – but yet stood mute as the country and its economy were raped and their promised powers ignominiously stripped. And this is the lesson that Guyanese should learn from the whole sordid cautionary tale still playing out at City Hall.
As the PNC Central Government leaders – all the way to the top – stood by their Mayoress (who’d been elevated to the Executive of the PNC in the meantime!) Nagamootoo, Ramjattan and all the other AFC leaders shamefully let Duncan swing in the wind. Until, of course, the Movement Against Parking Meters sprouted and came out into the streets.
It is but a foreshadowing of what faces the AFC, for sure, come 2020!
…on big job
Your Eyewitness’ heart bleeds for Anand Goolsarran. Earlier in the (political) game, he hitched his star to the APNU/AFC’s wagon. He was one of their “go to” guys if they wanted a quote in the Muckraker to drag the PPP and anyone associated with them, in the mud. Like most “born again” political acolytes, he wore his heart on his sleeve as he vouched for the purity of the new regime from his NGO platforms like Transparency International.
Corruption, he assured one and all, would disappear once those PPP types were ejected. All went well in the beginning as he was given some “forensic” audits to conduct. Goolsarran went after the PPP like a bull terrier – no subtleties here: he already KNEW the PPP was corrupt, so why even give their officials a hearing. He did mutter, however, that some who weren’t in the pack of early anti-PPP hounds were handed more audits than he.
So now he’s officially challenged why he wasn’t selected as the CEO for the Public Procurement Commission. He should know in these things, it’s not WHAT you know but WHO you know.
Poor Goolsarran isn’t a member of the Caricom club! Ouch!!
…on Caricom
Echoing John Lennon, the Caricom Secretary General wondered, “Imagine if there were no Caricom.”
Would anyone notice?
