Home Features No “ands, ifs or buts” – the MPs who seized the Mace...
Two attempts to remove the Mace, the symbol of authority in Guyana’s Parliament, have been made in our history. The first was in 1991 when a PPP MP, Ishar Bashir, took the Mace out of its position and handed it to Cheddi Jagan whom the Speaker refused to recognise. No attempt was made at that time to physically damage the Mace or physically remove it from the Parliament Chambers. As punishment, Bashir lost his seat for touching the Mace.
Parliament, through the Speaker, asserted its boundary in 1991, declaring emphatically that no person, not an MP or anyone else, was permitted to cross that boundary. The second was on Wednesday December 29, 2021, thirty years apart, when MP Ferguson seized the Mace, not merely removing it from its place, and tried taking it out of the Chambers. In 1991, Bashir was punished. Will Ferguson and her colleagues in 2021 get away with a clearly egregious act?
It is now a week since the disgraceful events in Parliament during the debate on the Natural Resource Fund Bill. Protest and misbehaviour in Parliament are not new to Guyana. There have been protests and vigorous screaming in our Parliament too many times. The truth is that inappropriate behaviour is part of the history of every single Parliament in democracies across the world. Parliamentary democracy is a messy thing indeed.
The disruption of the debate, the active disregard for the Speaker’s ruling on Wednesday December 29, 2021, was bad enough. But the attempt to steal the Mace, at least the attempt to remove the Mace from the Parliament Chamber, crossed the line that was clearly demarcated in 1991. The heroic effort of a Parliamentary staff member stopped MP Ferguson from seizing the Mace.
Those of us watching the proceedings live-streamed were shocked to see MP Annette Ferguson removing the Mace. She was not the only MP who touched the Mace. Others also joined in attacking the Parliamentary staff as MPs from APNU/AFC attempted to wrestle the Mace from the grip of the Parliamentary staff. One MP, Maureen Philadelphia, was seen using derogatory and racist language to describe the parliamentary staff. He was denounced by MP Philadelphia as a “House Negro”.
This was not the first time a PNC MP has deemed an Afro-Guyanese who works with the PPP Government a “House Negro” or “House Slave”. Dr. Roger Luncheon and others have been similarly insulted. While every aspect of the behaviour of MPs from APNU/AFC last Wednesday was disgraceful and unacceptable, the attempt to remove the Mace and the racist chant of an MP was not just disgraceful and unacceptable, these were actions that crossed the line, even in the very permissible environment that a Parliament allows.
There are those in APNU/AFC and some of their surrogates in the media that justify such behaviour by claiming that the removal of the Mace happened before. These charlatans explain that Cheddi Jagan and Ishar Bashir removed the Mace from its place in Parliament in 1991. But the circumstances were very different then. Cheddi was banned from speaking in Parliament for about three years before this incident. In 1991, he tried to speak as the Opposition Leader on a motion to extend the life of the Government, and to postpone the elections that were constitutionally due.
The Speaker refused to recognise him. That is when Bashir removed the Mace. It was wrong of Bashir then, even if the occasion justified some dramatic action. Of relevance is that Bashir was punished for this egregious action. He lost his seat in Parliament.
Just as it was wrong in 1991, just so it was wrong for MP Ferguson to remove the Mace from its location and for other MPs to try helping to vanish the Mace. Just as MP Bashir was penalised in 1991, just so must the MPs from last Wednesday’s aborted attempt to steal the Mace face the consequences. There must not be any “ands, ifs and buts”. Screaming and shouting to din the sound of those who were legitimately on the floor to speak in the debate is one thing, but removing the Mace must stand forever as a “no-no”.
The Speaker cannot excuse and cannot act with a symbolic tap on the hand of those MPs who tried removing the Mace. The MP from thirty years ago lost his seat for such behaviour. Ferguson and her colleagues were not being denied a chance to speak, were not being denied a chance to debate a very important bill. But they had very little to say on the bill. Instead, they decided to misbehave; they crossed a line that Parliament clearly said in 1991 must never be crossed. Retribution must be swift and serious, and must remind every MP from the 12th Parliament and all future Parliaments that certain misbehaviours would never be tolerated.
Ferguson today must face consequences that are no less than Bashir faced in 1991. Parliamentary democracy allows MPs room to huff and puff, but touching the Mace crosses the line. Just as the attempt to rig the March 2, 2020 elections was an attack on democracy, so too last Wednesday’s events represent a violent attack on Guyana’s democracy. The perpetrators must face the consequences.
