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No need for window dressing

Dec 09, 2011 Letters

 

Dear Editor,
Ethnic window dressing in government appointments is unacceptable to a voting public demanding change
I promised myself that I would stop writing letters after these elections. Yet I find myself penning letters to the press. The reason: there is a lot of ignorance out there that if not addressed promptly will be readily accepted by an intellectually acquiescent population leading to a pitiful perpetuation of more ignorance.
The latest one I’ve heard relates to Donald Ramotar’s recycling of the old fodder from Jagdeo’s Cabinet into his Cabinet. A PPP supporter had the nerve to assert that those complaining about the 20-person Cabinet must accept it because it is balanced given that it has nine non-Indian individuals. I’ve heard some stupidity but this takes the cake.
The reasoning is that the PPP has practised some form of ethnic window dressing by putting some non-Indian faces in Cabinet and that should trump the demand of the entire nation for change, better leadership and greater competency, transparency and less corruption. This is the kind of ignorance that continually kicks this country while it is down.
For starters, if the ethnic percentages are the basis for making a Cabinet reflective of and acceptable to the public, the fact that people of Indian ancestry hold 11 out of the 20 Cabinet positions or 55% while Indians as a population represent 43.45% in the 2002 Census should ring the first alarm bell. Similarly, four Africans in the Cabinet represent 20 per cent ethnic representation while Africans were at 30.2% in the 2002 Census. This debunks the foolish ethnic representation proportionality arguments of some of the charlatans who can’t see beyond their noses.
The Guyanese people do not need ethnic window dressing of faces of different complexions in certain positions when these individuals are nothing but a rank bunch of incompetents. They need quality people of every and any race. It is why many went out and voted for change in the election. There is nobody new in this Cabinet.
The PPP’s own favourite pollster, Vishnu Bisram, has confirmed in the past years that these Ministers are widely seen as failures by the voting public. Those who believe that putting a few faces of a certain hue in specific positions of government is good enough to quell the rumblings of the masses have clearly missed not just the bloody boat but the train and the aeroplane too.
The voting public is constantly maturing as the results of 2006 and 2011 have shown. They want more than just ethnic representation. They want competent representation. The fingerprints of Bharrat Jagdeo are all over Donald Ramotar and it ain’t good for the future of this nation. Window dressing won’t work in these new times.
M. Maxwell

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