AFC seeks opposition access to state media

Jun 02, 2011 News

The Alliance for Change intends to keep, in the fore, the issue of lack of access to state media by opposition political parties and activists, especially in the lead up to the general elections scheduled for this year.
This was emphasised by AFC candidate for Prime Minister and Member of Parliament, Sheila Holder, at the party’s weekly media briefing held at its Fourth Street Campbellville headquarters yesterday.
“The AFC believes that the media will have a vital role to play in adequately and fairly ventilating the critical issues for the benefit of the Guyanese electorate. The role of the state media will be important in providing equitable access to all political parties,” the party stated.
“It is hoped that the State’s resources will not be used and abused to confer an advantage to the incumbent PPP administration. The AFC believes that such constitutes a significant lack of democracy in Guyana today,” the AFC said.
But Mrs Holder said that as it obtains now, the governing party has been using the state media for its own propaganda purposes, while denying access to opposition groups.
“They are not only utilising the state media but abusing it, particularly against the AFC,” she said and added, “They have been misusing and abusing the only radio station in the country, and denying access to other parties.”
Mrs Holder said her party will be flagging this issue at every opportunity.
The AFC aired this concern as it announced that in intensifying the campaign for the 2011 general elections, it has begun the grassroots outreach machinery, ‘throughout the length and breadth of Guyana’.
The party reported that it has been meeting people in areas stretching from Dartmouth to Kwakwani, from Shieldstown to Corriverton, and to Chenapau.
The AFC said that in this outreach activity it has been able to further grasp the depth of underdevelopment that has been affecting Guyanese under past governments.
Some of the grievances that the party attributed to area residents were dust pollution in Cane Grove; Guysuco’s inadequate response to the injury suffered by the Blairmont Estate cane harvester, Davekumar Jainauth; confiscation of grazing pasture for Leonora cattle farmers; flooding of Bath and Woodley Park in West Coast Berbice; denial of the Number 30 Village, West Coast Berbice, residents’ right to electricity; and the $11.7 million toilet in Chenapau.
“The redress that has been received by these communities is a clear vindication of the AFC’s adoption of their plight and the representation that we have provided.”
While saying it looks forward to a competitive and professional 2011 elections campaign, the party said it is also looking to participate in a series of constructive debates with the PPP and the joint opposition parties.
According to the AFC, such debates, “will provide guidance to the voters and present the party best suited to bring changes and put Guyana back on the track of development”.

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AFC seeks opposition access to state media

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