AFC and APNU must ensure Parliament lasts until election 2016

Dec 10, 2011 Letters

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Dear Editor,
The PPP will try everything in the next year or so to trigger a no-confidence vote. It will then try to recoup its lost voters by using the old tactic of instilling fear in the minds of its base with imagery of the PNC/APNU gaining power. Anyone recall Robert Persaud’s blame-filled post-election tirade castigating PPP supporters for voting their conscience and voting for change?
The opposition majority in Parliament will be teased, tempted, harassed, goaded and lured in the next year or so to lose its cool and succumb to the wishes of the PPP for a no-confidence vote. It cannot fall prey to the game that is about to unfold. It can’t fall for the PPP’s familiar right hook.
For the PPP knows its window to benefit from any fear about APNU’s rise is very short. Once the Guyanese people of all races and political stripes start seeing serious legislative initiatives in Parliament from the AFC and APNU designed to fight corruption, remove state dominance of the media, reduce Jagdeo’s ludicrous pension, fix bloated bureaucracy and the like, they will start assessing politics differently.
If there is one thing APNU and the AFC have to do in Parliament is to drive an agenda of change now that the Ramotar-led PPP installed the same set of familiar Jagdeo administration failures in its Cabinet.
The people know there is no change coming from the PPP so it will look to the AFC and APNU to deliver the change they crave. Once change starts unfolding and years pass, the PPP and the PNC/APNU cannot use fear-based politics anymore to trap its supporters. Time will erase fears.
Four critical things must be accomplished by the AFC and APNU for this country to break free. To accomplish those they need all five of those years spanning elections.
Firstly, APNU and the AFC must target the government’s domination of the media. That should be paramount. Decimate the ability of government to dominate the media and the message.
This shocking, current prescription where a minority government exercises majority control of the state media cannot be allowed.
Further, national broadcast licences should be handed out to every television and radio operator so that all stations and not just NCN should have nationwide coverage. Secondly, after media reform is satisfied, the rush should be to curb the powers of the presidency.
The AFC and APNU must, and I repeat, must push for a referendum on the powers of the presidency. In fact, if APNU and the AFC fail to push for a referendum for the presidency, voters should punish them in 2016 for this failure. Eviscerate the presidency of those ungodly powers and our democracy will be better. The PNC for some unexplained reason quite foolishly failed to change the Burnham constitution prior to 1992 and got stuck with its ugly manifestations for 19 years thereafter. It gets a second chance to fix this mess.
The PPP with its declining returns in every election since 2001 (54,000 total votes lost) and this hopeless no-change Cabinet knows that its fortunes will continue to fall and it too must seek constitutional reform of the presidency to protect its future. It had a chance but blew it in the early 2000s, when it masqueraded some useless constitutional commission and ended up leaving all those ridiculous presidential powers intact.
The AFC and APNU have to use article 164, pick out the sections with the worst excesses of presidential powers in the Burnham Constitution, and send them packing.
The majority of this country, regardless of race and political favour, are adamant about constitutional change.
The third vital change that must be administered is mind-blowingly serious election/electoral change. The GECOM debacle must no longer be allowed to strangulate and suffocate an entire nation with hysteria, paranoia and cold sweats for days on end. There aren’t enough psychologists practicing in Guyana to handle that level of nervous breakdowns. The electoral system must be completely overhauled to ensure independence. Hire foreigners to do the job. Buy voting machines. Revamp the constitutional clauses on the elections commission to remove all political traces of interference and partiality. Put electoral reform in the referendum package. Guyanese who just experienced the nonsense with GECOM will vote for it.
The fourth major assault from APNU and the AFC, using their newfound Parliamentary powers, is to go to war against corruption. Spill some serious parliamentary blood over corruption to change this system because corruption leads to economic marginalization, impoverishment, inequality and illegal and unfair wealth redistribution. To succeed in these four areas, APNU and the AFC must work with the PPP to have consensual change. They have to ensure that whatever changes they make in those four areas, that they place them in constitutional cement that requires further referendums from the entire Guyanese nation to change in the future.
If the PPP refuses, the AFC and APNU must battle alone to perfect our democracy. To get these four major policy targets done and dusted, APNU and the AFC have to go into the Parliamentary ring thinking of a long, hard fight. They must concede, where necessary, to allow them time to come back with devastating counterattacks. They cannot be baited into no-confidence dalliances. Run this one like a marathon.
The PPP can steal APNU and AFC’s thunder by pushing these reforms itself, reinventing itself as a humble and moderate party and starting serious internal reform. If the AFC and APNU or PPP win on those four counts, it would not matter who wins elections thereafter. The PPP or APNU/PNC or AFC could win every single election in the future thereafter and the system would work to prevent rigging and to protect the poor and powerless, the downtrodden and the besieged, and the rich and the powerful alike with fairness, justice and equality. In fact, the system would prevent political domination in the future.
If Parliament gets these main issues done and it lasts for five years, remarkable change will come to Guyana.
M. Maxwell

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