An argument as to why there may be another general election

Mar 07, 2012 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Mr. Ralph Ramkarran is in the news again. He was silent after the selection of Donald Ramotar as the PPP’s Presidential entry for the 2011 General Elections. Now he has re-appeared with frequency in the Chronicle- the very Chronicle that the Parliament needs as a matter of urgency to reorganize so that others apart from PPP personnel like Ramkarran can be read in the state-owned paper.
Interesting to note is that many of Ramkarran’s pieces in his party’s newspaper, the Mirror, turn up in the Chronicle. It was Ramkarran’s party, when in Opposition, that quarreled about the practice of paramountcy of the party under former President Forbes Burnham. Once Mr. Ramkarran returned to public discourse, the national anticipation was that he would explain how and why the PPP chose acclamation over voting in its Executive Committee to select Mr. Ramotar.
It would have meant at the last minute, right at the very meeting, Mr. Ramkarran declined to compete.
There were two interesting points that Mr. Ramkarran made last week. When you contextualize them and place them alongside two given facts (Ramkarran is a member of the leading organ of the PPP, the Executive Committee and he is writing openly in support of the new hierarchy in the PPP since the election) then one can see where the PPP is heading.
First, in a debate with Mr. Christopher Ram on the Fiscal Management and Accountability Act 2003 under which the combined opposition voted down the expenditure for the specialty hospital, Mr. Ramkarran implied that a racist factor may have been at work because after all, the Georgetown Mayor had referred to the project as a manifestation of colonization of Guyana by India (which when reading the Mayor’s piece did not explicitly say so).
It was a shocking connection to make since the AFC with top quality Indian leaders like Khemraj Ramjattan and Moses Nagamootoo voted against the expenditure. Was this race-baiting by Mr. Ramkarran? Is there a connection between Ramkarran’s accusation of racism against the AFC and APNU and President Ramotar’s outburst last month of the ethnic composition of GECOM’s staff and how APNU personnel chased PPP voters away in South Georgetown?
Mr. Ramkarran had shown a side that only this writer had the courage to expose ten years ago and since then had been scrutinizing the politics of this gentleman.
Then Mr. Ramkarran journeyed into familiar waters on Monday. He advised PPP supporters not to worry about the failure of the Government to pass the 2012 budget because the electorate will know who to blame. It is indeed familiar territory of an upcoming election.
Warning the opposition, Mr. Ramkarran noted, “They will ignore the electorate’s message at their peril.”
Khemraj Ramjattan has been quoted in this newspaper as saying that there is sufficient reason why the PPP will not call an election, two of which concern us here. One is that Parliament will have to vote money for the election. He doubts Parliament will do that.
A quick reply. I am not familiar with the moneyed side of Parliamentary discussions but what if the two billion dollars that Khemraj mentioned is handed over to GECOM by the Ministry of Finance from sums they already have? Is that possible?
Secondly, Khemraj Ramjattan pointed to primaries in the election of future PPP Presidential candidates. He thinks Ramotar may be ousted in any democratic proceeding. Thirdly, there is the feeling among Guyanese that Mr. Ramotar will not want to shave off three years from his five-year reign to call an election in 2014.
These arguments are intellectually plausible but there are competing theories, one of which I will briefly touch on and revisit in an entire column. The longer the AFC and APNU stay in Parliament; the more authority they accumulate from the laws and the Constitution; the more power they have in exposing Jagdeo’s twelve years of horrible rule.
One of the reasons (my opinion) that Nagamootoo wanted the Speakership was because he is bent on showing PPP constituencies that the PPP that Jagan created became a monster that would have swallowed up Jagan too.
The fear the PPP has with an Opposition-controlled Parliament is that commissions of inquiries, investigations, probes, etc, will lead to the loss of power with probably indictments from the local law enforcement agencies and foreign governments, particularly the US. Is the PPP willing to live in that uncertain climate until 2016? Can the PPP Government survive until 2016?

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An argument as to why there may be another general election

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