Did a meeting take place?

Jul 14, 2010 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Stabroek News reported that a closed door exchange of ideas took place at Freedom House last month to explore a third presidential nomination for Mr. Jagdeo. It must be noted at all times that a third term for Mr. Jagdeo must not be confused with a third term nomination. There is no guarantee that Mr. Jagdeo can win in 2011 if he is selected as the PPP’s point man for a third time.
At the time of typing this column, there has only been one denial from the PPP side and it came from Mr. Jagdeo. All eyes had to be on Mr. Ramotar because the SN reported that the meeting took place inside Freedom House.
Mr. Ramotar is in charge of Freedom House. There is no way a group of PPP leaders with the President can waltz into Freedom House, deliberate on a changing of the Guyana Constitution, come to conclusions about Mr. Jagdeo’s political career and Mr. Ramotar would not know about that occurrence. So who is right and who is wrong?
Readers would be displeased with me if I should refuse to give my opinion. With only a denial from President Jagdeo to date, I would go with the Stabroek News. In the publication of that story, because of its extreme sensitivity and libelous implications if it proved to be untrue, the Stabroek News would not have rushed to print.
I have been associated with newspapers a long time to know how they operate. They would have definitely done some soul-searching before going to the printing machine.
Let us put aside the discussion about the existence of the secret conference and look at another angle. Suppose there is a change of heart and Mr. Jagdeo wants to see the Constitution modified to allow him to compete for a third opportunity, wouldn’t he have to put his record on the table? In doing so, he would have to place an eleven-year-old balance sheet for examination.
The purpose of this essay is to give some thought to the so-called rationale for the continuation of Mr. Jagdeo in office as was put forward at that alleged meeting.
Stabroek News reported that the main fulcrum of the third term advocates that there are a series of huge projects that Mr. Jagdeo started and would want to steer into completion. It is doubtful that his challengers would accept that because it lacks a basis in common sense.
All governments, without exception, plan way ahead into the future. Some programmes, beneficial for the existence of the nation state itself, take longer than the length of the tenure of the incumbent.
A good example is Barack Obama. His policy to switch from US’s over-dependence on imported oil, if it is to be successful, will come to the surface long after Obama leaves the presidency.
It is actually foolish for any leader to argue that he/she needs to be in government to carry out long-term planning.
The objections are many. First, it denotes that there is no matching talent and that governmental endeavours rest on the shoulders of one person. Secondly, the resources pushing the projects come from the country, not one person. For example, if Guyana was to move its capital, how relevant is the presence of one particular president to oversee that.
Wouldn’t it take loans from international lending agencies, capital injections from the government itself and a polling of resources from the private and public sectors to make the transformation a reality?
Let’s look at a specific proposal mentioned in that Stabroek News report. Why would it take the presence of Mr. Jagdeo only to see through the LCDS over the next five years? What specific skills does Mr. Jagdeo possess in that particular area that no other PPP contender has? Mr. Jagdeo is an economics degree holder. So is Mr. Ramotar.
Mr. Ralph Ramkarran has been a long practicing lawyer. What particular scientific knowledge about the LCDS does Mr. Jagdeo have that cannot be acquired by his contenders? From all of the contents of the Guyana-Norway Agreement, it does not need the present Guyanese President and Norwegian Prime Minister to be the respective heads of their countries to keep the LCDS going.
It will take a separate article to examine Mr. Jagdeo’s performance, but on that score and on the argument that he needs to be in the driving seat to bring his future projects to completion, his third term champions will have to pull off some magic to convince Messrs. Ramotar and Ramkarran that the PPP needs Mr. Jagdeo’s indispensability for another five years.

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Did a meeting take place?

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