THE VOTE DETERMINED THE OPTIONS

Mar 26, 2010 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Very few political observers, excluding those in ROAR who had done a survey of voter preferences, could have predicted that the PNC would have done as well as it did in the 1992 elections.
Most observers underestimated, ignored, or gave little credence to what was known as the ethnic security dilemmas and thus totally misread the level of support that the PNC enjoyed in those elections. It was assumed that the PNC would struggle, given the punishment they had brought onto the Guyanese people and the level of incompetence, mismanagement and corruption that characterized their time in government.
The PNC however secured 43% of the votes cast in those elections. The PPP won on a landslide but given the stark divisions that the results revealed, it was clear that there was an even greater need than previously anticipated for unity and reconciliation.
Dr. Cheddi Jagan, the new President, must have quickly sized up the situation. Many of the distinguished individuals who were in Guyana for the elections must have also advised him that it would court trouble for his new government and probably divide the country further unless steps were taken to promote national reconciliation.
It must also be recalled that there were forces in Guyana hell bent on creating unrest. They had already shown what they were capable of by actions on elections day, during which there was a public attempt to thwart the elections and return Guyana to the dark days of the sixties.
Dr. Jagan realized the position that he was in. There would be no major victory parade. Instead he addressed the nation and called for unity. He said, “We must move forward together and make into reality our motto: ‘One People One Nation, One Destiny’….. We do so without rancour, without recrimination, without victimization, without in any way trying to cast blame.”
The criticism has been made that Dr. Cheddi Jagan failed to investigate the massive corruption that was believed to have taken place under the PNC and failed to hold the former government accountable for its actions. These are easy criticisms to make, but the objective conditions at the time militated a completely different approach since to have gone down that route would have opened the government to charges of witch-hunting, recrimination and victimization.
Given the divisions within the society and the apprehensions of the loyalty of the security forces – apprehensions reinforced by the voting patterns in the Disciplined Services vote – it was understandable that the PPP should not have pursued a massive investigation into the administrative excess of the past.
Not that corruption was totally ignored. It was not. There were initial plans to dig up the corruption graveyards, but this plan was quickly shelved. However, some investigation was done into controversial acts, and included the disposal of assets by the former President just before he demitted office. There was also a commission of inquiry into the violence on elections day but onto now the report of this inquiry has not been published.
During the transition period, a great deal of documentation was destroyed. In fact, reports in the press suggested that documents were being burnt in the compound of Parliament Buildings. Also, all the Cabinet records were not located and were supposedly either removed or destroyed.
The PPP also found resistance to its early attempts at removing certain public officials and in combating corruption. This probably confirms, even though in hindsight, that had the PPP moved to a more massive investigation; had it held former officials of the PNC government to account for its actions, there would have been great trouble.
The immediate task was one of reconstruction. The economy was in tatters. Over ninety per cent of revenues were needed to meet debt payments. The physical infrastructure – roads, schools, sea defences, electricity, and water – was in crisis. There was a great deal of work to be done, resources to be mobilized and a country to rebuild.
There are those who would however still argue that the former government should have been brought to book and that certain officials should have faced jail time. But that would have come at a price, which may have retarded progress. But it may have also been difficult, given the ethnic insecurity of the time, for the PPP government to have gone down that road without opening itself to charges of recrimination.
Perhaps things would have been different had the voting patterns been different. Perhaps had the PNC in 1992 been reduced to a 10% party that so many had predicted, the investigation into the excesses of the past might have been undertaken.
The vote however decided the options. It still does.

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