The Election Campaign for 2011 - Expect ugly developments

The Election Campaign for 2011 – Expect ugly developments

Jan 09, 2011 AFC Column, Features / Columnists

By Khemraj Ramjattan
AFC Chairman

Make no bones about it. Everyone knows that campaigning for the next election has started. The expertise that our main political parties have acquired over the past 50 years in promoting division between our six races is already apparent. Divide and rule is the tactic used. Reject it!
Racial stereotypes, abusive language, personal insult and characterizing free thinkers as traitors to their race, are now the standard fare of our newspapers, radio and television stations as well as in the use of the Internet and its new technologies such as Facebook.
The AFC wishes to be held to the highest standards of public scrutiny. We have never, and will never, descend to using these tactics as the means of garnering political support.
Our appeal will always be to the best instincts of those who support us. Outside of this support, our appeal will always be to citizens who are tired of divisive politics and weary of crime and corruption. We are satisfied that the vast majority of Guyanese wish for a peaceful and productive future for themselves and their families.
These citizens, in communities all across our country, keep telling us that they wish to be involved in the task of building a just, fair and stable society where citizens respect the rule of law and where their fundamental rights will be protected.
We are not suggesting that these objectives will be easy to fulfil. Here’s what we are saying:
· that every citizen must demand opportunities for hard work and honest sacrifice as the only route to personal success;
· that the practice of collecting taxes and distributing the country’s wealth and natural resources as gifts for supporters must be condemned as criminal acts;
· that we all share responsibilities for rooting out the bribery and corruption that has become the new way of conducting public business;
· that pandering to the worst instincts of human beings and promoting obscene new levels of racial division only serve to insult the intelligence of citizens, demean the respect we ought to have for each other and further destroy our social relations.
As a young political party that is committed to the task of helping to build a safe, secure and productive future, our task is to give strength and hope to all members of our six races.
The Unconstitutional “Third” Term
The AFC was very correct as to the thinking and activities of the Jagdeo faction of the PPP on the issue of staying in power beyond his term limit. The party did pronounce since early last year that the President will, with not too subtle a sleight of hand, pull off a third term and/or a major extension of his second term. His term must end later this year.
Notwithstanding rebuttals by the President and his propagandists on this issue, we are convinced that Bharrat Jagdeo will scuttle the arrangements for elections this year through multiple manoeuvres at the legal and political levels. Our information is that major elements of the PNCR may not find this approach one to be condemned or denounced. Steps are already being taken to achieve this.
Over these past 18 years, the methodology of the PPP is clear to everyone. In the words of one writer in the letter-to-the-editor columns, it is CONTROL, CONTROL, CONTROL. Those who support this manipulation of our sacred Constitution will soon reveal themselves.
We have an urgent duty to end the pain caused by this grotesquely centralized system where one man is cloaked with all-knowing wisdom, where the winner has taken everything, and where the people’s resources continue to be distributed as though these are members of the administration’s personal property.
Reject the Third Term or any extension of the Second and Say No!

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