Politics of garbage, garbage of politics

Aug 05, 2010 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

There is no other tribalized nation in this world like Guyana. In no other country would you find a Prime Minister or President who won a UN environment award yet his capital city is the most fetid in the world because of a mountainous pile up of disease-producing garbage. And the central government refuses to acknowledge that it is a global eyesore and a threat to the health of the nation. Unfortunately the City Council is backing down and has taken steps without the Government’s generosity to start the fumigation process.
The ruling cabal escapes each time this nation reaches the precipice. And the humanity of the other side, not the regime saves the country. In 1997, it was Mr. Yesu Persaud who pioneered the intervention of Caricom. In 1999, the Public Service Union’s general strike imploded and saved the Government.
In 2001, Mr. Hoyte defied a majority in the PNC’s central committee and started what is referred to in Guyanese political parlance as the Dialogue. After the Lusignan Massacre, the major stakeholders positively responded to Mr. Jagdeo’s call for political consensus. After the dust settled, the PPP returned to tribal politics.
With a huge crisis looming over the city, the Council backed down and has commenced partial cleaning. The Georgetown citizenry wants the filth to be washed up but Georgetowners are so defiant and resentful of the central authorities that they would have loved to see a confrontation. It would have been interesting to see where it would have ended.
The politics of garbage has exposed the bestial nature of this government. To spite the City Council, the Champions of the Earth want to despoil the earth of Georgetown and for what – to embarrass the City Council. So playing a game is the priority even though it can lead to deadly epidemics.
The nasty dimension of this brutal game is that the City Council is an underling of centralized power. It cannot prosecute defaulters who don’t pay taxes, it cannot raise its own revenues and it is subject to Government’s intransigence. In the midst of this game is the hard reality that the City Council’s budget cannot allow for effective functions.
The City Council does not have money to pay the disposal companies. This doesn’t bother the Champions of the Earth. They want the miasma (hope they don’t throw it on other critics as they did to me) to pile up to make the Mayor look bad. But even the blind can see the boomerang. Citizens think that the Government is to be blamed.
The City Council lost a strategic battle when it fell for the persuasion of some Pro- Government businessmen that borrowed some trucks and got the Council to provide the labour. The Council should have insisted on payment from the Government to the companies that are owed monies by the Council. It was a terrible retreat that will have political consequences for Mayor Green and the Councilors. People were expecting them to put up a fight. Let the mountains of filth grow and let us see who would have broken first.
The politics of garbage suddenly turned into the garbage of politics. The leadership of the Private Sector Commission and the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce actually spoke the unthinkable on the garbage crisis. When I read it, I began to look for the harshest adjectives to describe this type of thinking of some of our business folks. I came up with the garbage of politics. This newspaper quoted the businessmen as saying that they approached the disposal companies and asked them to return to work. This paper quotes Gerry Gouveia as saying that though they have trouble getting paid they also have an obligation to keep the city clean. This is rubbish!
These business entities work on the same business ethic as Gerry Gouveia – they seek a profit after they would have recaptured their original sum spent in the venture. If they are owed $27M, can Gouveia then tell us why they should continue to serve a customer that doesn’t pay?
And why didn’t Gouveia, Ramesh Dookhoo and others ask the Government to pay the $27M? But more importantly, why don’t these men pay the money so garbage collection can start?
Why must two small companies clean up Georgetown and lose $27M? If Gouveia and company so love Guyana, then nationalism dictates that they pay the outstanding sum. Not in a long time have I seen such an egregious manifestation of the garbage of politics.

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