GUYANA 2009 – A DEMOCRAZY!

Aug 16, 2009 AFC Column, Features / Columnists

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‘We have reached a cul de sac at this juncture of our history’

By Khemraj Ramjattan
AFC Chairman
A few weeks ago I sought to elucidate as best as I can the importance of Ministerial responsibility and accountability in a piece by that name.
The criticism made then was that our Ministers in Guyana love to live up the power and privileges side of a “Westminster” Government tradition, but fail miserably to live up the accountability and responsibility side. The example I dealt with there was Minister Robert Persaud’s breach of his duty of frankness and candour to Parliament. He first told the Economic Services Committee about the non-availability of GuySuCo’s Business Plan in July 2008. He later was forced to contradict this by admitting that GuySuCo’s Business Plan was given to the European Union in June 2008 after it was sent to Cabinet in March 2008 for approval.
The late delivery to the EU cost our sugar industry $1.6B. Such impropriety and inept stewardship in any other democracy would have realized the prompt resignation or dismissal from Government of the Minister. Not here under the PPP/C.
The attitude of the Ministers and high Government officials since then has worsened. It is firmly my view now that it is delusional to think that we will see any exhibition of democratic value from any of them. We, thus, have evolved from a fledgling democracy in 1990’s to a bloody democrazy in 2009.
Let us take Dr. Leslie Ramsammy. No doubt he is a bright spot in a lacklustre Cabinet, at least up to the time of the revelations and the conflagration at his Ministry. But to now see him denying his way out of the revelations from the Simels trial is torturous for me. This is a very serious matter, which anywhere else would have already seen a resignation and a demand by the Minister that an independent enquiry be held to clear his good name. But not here in Guyana! To a large extent this variety of political culture is what has put us in this quagmire.
Our Home Affairs Minister Mr. Clement Rohee, like a suspect – (or some may argue like an intellectual author) – takes cover under his right to remain silent when asked what he had to say in connection with Simels’s testimony that he met with him here in Guyana. You would think the reporters were interrogators who had just read the Honourable Minister his Miranda rights. “I will never ever make any comment…” is his response.
Guyanese have a right to know whether our Minister spoke to the Attorney for Roger Khan and what about. Why should one as loudmouthed as he about the Ministry of Health fire, be so tightlipped about his transient association with Simels? Unless what they spoke about was a matter of State, which it surely was not, a senior functionary like a Home Affairs Minister should not clam up like that. All manner of unenlightened speculation can be the consequence of the Minister’s silence.
The one I like best, however, is Ms. Gail Teixeira denouncing the Ambassador and High Commissioners of America, Britain, and Canada for writing a joint letter to the Minister of Local Government urging that legislation, concerning the long-awaited Local Government Reform, reflect the agreed diminution of the Minister’s discretion and powers. Honourable Minister Khellawan Lall, the portfolio Minister, says nothing. But Gail gets on like a hurricane. “This is interference in the internal affairs of Guyana,” she lambastes most undiplomatically.
This attitude can frustrate and damage external cooperation and can be met with responses which can affect us adversely. But nothing will happen to Gail….not a reprimand, a slap on the wrist, or a courteous third-party apology. Rather, Ministers and senior officials are generally rewarded for irresponsibility under this regime.
This ever- increasing misbehaviour in high places will get us nowhere. Worse still, when added to such misbehavior, is the application of the defence of governmental sovereignty. I can put it no better than Paul Collier, Professor at Oxford, in his latest book “Wars, Guns and Votes“ when he writes “… a fake democracy protected by the sanctity of sovereignty is a cul de sac.”
This acclaimed author of “The Bottom Billion” was making the argument that public goods of all varieties are in short supply in poor countries like Guyana. What can bring them out of the bottom is a supply of such goods from the rich nations.
Accountability of government is one such important public good. Security is another. And the consumable tangibles like vaccines for malaria, antiretrovirals for AIDS, loans for infrastructural works, and so on, is the third. However, when rich countries send the tangibles, the Gails of the bottom billion countries never shout: “Sovereignty…..this is interference in our country’s affairs!” Actually they lap these tangibles up. When, however, rich countries merely suggest the giving of the two other public goods, the Gails of the poor countries make one big hue and cry. These public goods they do not want!
Yes, I think we have reached a cul de sac at this juncture of our history that makes us not a democracy but a democrazy.

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