Can good governance be defined?

Dec 23, 2008 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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The rulers of this country have absolute standards by which they judge all forms of behaviour except governance. A favourite type of sermon of President Jagdeo and the leadership of the PPP is the ethics of professional journalism.

Recently I referred to Minister Robeson Benn’s castigation of the Kaieteur News on two occasions. In one incident, he felt that when the newspaper reported on the conduct on his son in a police incident, his son’s side should have been given the same depth of coverage.

Secondly, he faulted this newspaper for a story that called into question the safety of civil aviation in Guyana.

President Jagdeo at the launching of the Guyana Times newspaper lambasted the private media for unprofessional conduct. Most Ministers of Government are annoyed at the incessant reporting of crime on the front page of the two independent dailies.

The reason is that it does not do the image of the country any good. The longest standing PPP critic of the private media is Mrs. Janet Jagan. In a number of articles in the Mirror newspaper for 2008, she outlined what she has termed the private media’s hostility to the PPP.

Many of these bitter fulminations of the private media of Mrs. Jagan are extremely biased because she conveniently overlooks the complete shutting out of the voice of the independent section of society and the opposition parties in the state media.

Any discussion on democracy will have to conclude that state property must not be a tool in the hands of the ruling party but must take into account the interest of the total society. We will come to that below.

From the private media, we move to opposition behaviour. The presidency and the ruling party have a well-thought out blueprint as to what is responsible opposition conduct.

The opposition parties must not confront the government for the sake of confrontation. Violence must never be contemplated. Within the spirit of patriotism, those on the other side of the divide should cooperate with government when policies are in the interest of the general population.

It was Prime Minister Sam Hinds who went the farthest on speaking on how disappointing the detractors of Government are when he said that the possibility of Government ending its monopoly on radio is remote because radio in private hands contributed to the advent of genocide in Rwanda. The business community gets its lecture too on how to invest in the country’s future.

What the PPP Government and the presidency avoid like the plague is any exchange on what constitutes good governance. One suspects that President Jagdeo will end his presidential career without having the experience of debating his opposition counterparts. If he demits office in 2011, he would have completed three Westminister terms.

This is like being the Prime Minister of a Caricom state after three consecutive elections. It would be highly unusual for any president to have been in power for twelve years and never square off in a live television debate or in front of an audience.

PPP leaders do not give interviews to journalists that are in the private media. The ghost that they run away from is the definition of good governance. Does a government have a mandate to do what it wants once it is legally elected? Does the opposition have rights that should be respected by the government of the day?

Should features like transparency and accountability be observed as part of the governance process? Now interestingly, the PPP and President Jagdeo would most predictably agree to these terms. Where the ghost comes in is that they would be hard pressed to defend the existence of these values in the exercise of governance.

This is the fundamental reason why PPP leaders do not feel comfortable with the independent media. The perversities of sixteen years would be impossible to defend. Does good governance involve the exoneration of Ministers accused of sexual misconduct? Does it involve privatizing state property that was not in accordance with the laws of the country?

Should a Minister of the Government be retained and made an Ambassador when he employs a dubious character that was accused of murdering a food vendor over a $20 debt quarrel? Should a ministerial advisor keep his job while he was seen live on television fighting with a spectator at an international boxing match?

This is just the tip of the iceberg of bad governance that the ruling PPP is helplessly drowning in. One can go on to compare scandals of the 28 years of the PNC rule to the sixteen years of the PPP stewardship. The statistics and evidence would reveal that the PPP has outdone the PNC.

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