Time is still on the opposition side

Jul 15, 2010 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I recently saw a movie that involved production by the BBC. Once I learned that, I thought I should buy the movie because the BBC would do a good job. As it turned out, I was right. Titled “The Boys are Back,” it tells the story of a single father trying to bring up two sons while holding down a full time journalist job.
So duty called in Australia to cover the Australian Open and he couldn’t go because he had no one to nanny the kids. Instead, he sent in his reports by plagiarizing the television accounts of the tennis. Then the bigger son remonstrated with him. He told him sooner than later the newspaper will catch up with the fraud. The father listened and had to leave the boys on their own.
I thought of this movie when I read the analysis of Sir Ron Sanders in this newspaper and Harry Hergash in the Stabroek News on the forthcoming elections. Both gentlemen do not live in Guyana and it brings into question how on-the-spot can your coverage be of a country in which you are transmitting information from second hand-sources.
I honestly do not know if Sir Ron and Mr Hergash have been traveling to Guyana regularly and have been seeking out the subtle nuances of politics in this land. If this is so, then an apology is offered.
Sir Ron did not go into any direct analysis of the political parties, only expressing his belief that the PPP will win again. There was sustained offering as to why that would be an outcome but Sanders did mention briefly, Guyana’s improved economy.
Harry Hergash’s broom swept far and wide. What he offered in his evaluation was his opinions. There were plenty of opinions in his assessment as to who would win. Like Sanders, he concluded, it will be the PPP. It is impossible to tell someone that their opinions are wrong. Why your opinion is right and another person’s opinion is wrong? I can think of the World Cup in soccer that was just concluded. Most opinions are divided as to who is the best footballer in the work – Ronaldo from Portugal and Messi from Argentina.
But the super-star from England, Rooney said last week, long before the final, that the best guy in the game was the man who scored the winning goal for Spain, Iniesta.
This writer is not going to say that Mr. Hergash’s opinions are wrong. He is entitled to them. My angle in this article here is to focus on the lopsided methodology he used. In writing his two-part series, one would like to think that the emphasis would have been on the balance-sheet on an incumbent. At the time of the election, the PPP would have been in power for nineteen years.
Instead Mr. Hergash concentrated over two-thirds of his coverage on the opposition, literally sweeping under the carpet a type of governance in Guyana never seen in these parts of the world before.
My task here is not to say that Mr. Hergash is wrong in his judgements. Those are his. I will take the position that whatever faults he finds in the opposition parties the ruling party outmatched them by million of miles. Some interesting items creep up in Mr. Hergash’s piece. He cites as proof of good economic performance, Sir Ron Sanders’s opinion that whoever wins would inherit a country that has improved in terms of development under Mr. Jadgeo.
I find this strange that one can argue that the PPP will win the election but instead of citing figures offered as prove of economic development, the opinion of another person. This is what I mean by lopsided methodology. Mr. Hergash did recite figures of growth that many experts in Guyana would doubt.
Hergash’s understanding of how elections shape up, and what can make a candidate win is fundamentally flawed. A particular issue can cause a politician to lose a poll despite ongoing accomplishments. The greatest American incumbent can do the greatest things but if in an election, there is exposure of extra-marital affair, then, no progress can cause him to win. In Barbados, there was steady progress, yet Owen Arthur lost because people just wanted a change.
In Guyana, the scandals are so horrendous that the opposition can win. It all depends on how they shape their campaign. There is still time left for the opposition groupings to get their act together. It is best to drop the surprise near to election rather than give the PPP time to plan their strategy.

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Time is still on the opposition side

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