Our Cabinet may be too young

Sep 28, 2008 Features / Columnists, My Column

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There has long been the debate about whether youth holds an advantage over experience or vice versa. Most older people would say that the two should go hand in hand because one complements the other.

This may be the reason why Democratic Presidential candidate, Barack Obama, chose as his running mate, an older man, Joe Biden.

On the other side, the Republican Presidential candidate, John McCain chose a young woman, Sarah Palin to be his running mate. A young John Kennedy chose Lyndon Johnson and the list is long of such pairings.

Their Cabinet would consist of youth and experience but for the greater part experience would predominate. This may be the reason why the United States of America became the great country that it is and continues to be. The Soviet Union, when it existed, had geriatrics and in the end it collapsed.

Guyana is not an island; it is a part of the global village and its politics will continue to be influenced by what is going on in the rest of the world.

It has a young president, a man so young that at one stage people wondered whether he could have provided the kind of leadership necessary to take Guyana forward.

He has done a lot. He has succeeded in securing debt write-offs, although some say that the write-offs were imminent and that he did not have to do much. He also helped fashion the kind of economy that has kept the country afloat even in these difficult times.

The problem, however, seems to be his preoccupation with youth to the extent that he has a very young Cabinet that raises serious questions about the ability of his Ministers to execute their role as effectively as they should.

These are the people who must interface with their counterparts in the wider world; people who must be able to command the respect of the people with whom they have to hold discussions and to negotiate.

Today the issue of the Economic Partnership Agreement is a dominant factor in the life of this country. The European Union is adamant that Guyana and the CARIFORUM countries sign it as it is. The EU contends that the negotiations are over and the final product will remain as it is.

The harsh truth is that the team that negotiated on behalf of the region comprised young men who may not have commanded the kind of respect that was needed.

On the other side of the table were older men who had the experience and who must have used that to browbeat their young negotiators.

President Jagdeo’s youth might have been a factor among his Caricom colleagues when he sought to convince them that the EPA should not be signed in its present form. An older person might have swung their perspective.

When Guyana moved to the World Court to challenge Suriname which kept insisting that it owned more of the Corentyne River than it actually did, the team that represented this country was a mixture of youth and experience.

The leadership was provided by the experienced Sir Shridath Ramphal and the youngest person on the team was not much older than President Jagdeo.

The result is now history. Guyana prevailed and oil explorations are ongoing in the very areas that Suriname threatened.

I mention these things because over the years I have noticed the move by President Jagdeo to show a preference for youth in his Cabinet.

This is not a bad thing because it allows for the preparation of leaders of the future. These young people will learn and one day they will be able to conduct negotiations that would see Guyana holding its own in any forum.

But the absence of enough people of experience may be taking its toll. The young Cabinet appears to be beholden to President Jagdeo to the point that they are afraid to take decisions. It is as if they are puppets waiting to be pulled by the President.

Freddie Kissoon keeps carping about President Jagdeo micro-managing the economy, but he refuses to recognize that this may be because of the very young Cabinet and the President’s recognition that he had better use his experience to ensure that what needs to be done gets done.

Come October 2, the Foreign Minister would be leading a delegation to a forum of the African component of the African Caribbean and Pacific countries to press Guyana’s case for something other than what now passes for the EPA. That delegation is a careful mix of youth and experience.

President Jagdeo did not rush to select a battery of young people who might not have been able to do justice to this country’s position.

By the same token I wonder whether he would not adjust the composition of his Cabinet to reflect the kind of experience needed at this time.

Indeed there is Prime Minister Sam Hinds, Cabinet Secretary Dr Roger Luncheon, Attorney General Doodnauth Singh, Robeson Benn and Dr Henry Jeffrey who are well over 50 years old. The others are all very young and often are left to feel their way.

Perhaps they could be supported by Permanent Secretaries who have the experience, but here again, this is not generally the case. I stand corrected but I doubt that I am wrong.

These young people sometimes do not even command the respect of the local population and this is doing the country no good.

The situation is such that many things are not going smoothly and the population is becoming restive. The nature of government is about respect.

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