Elected dictatorship takes over the airwaves

Mar 20, 2013 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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I ran into my political colleague and personal friend, Lincoln Lewis, on Monday morning inside Nigel’s Supermarket. We had a disagreement over the TUC’s engagement with PM Hinds, Winston Brassington and Ashni Singh over the Marriott Hotel deal that excluded the employment of Guyanese on the project.
I approached Lincoln to inform him that on that day (Monday), our mutual friend Elton McRae had published a trenchantly critical letter in both independent dailies of that meeting.
Lincoln Lewis’ immediate response was “Freddie even your enemies you have to engage and talk to.” There and then I vehemently disagreed. You just don’t talk to your enemy as a matter of policy. Engagement with your adversary is a strategic concept – more strategic and conceptual.
You have to understand your opponent first before you begin your visit. If you don’t then when you walk into the room, you can either be arrested or killed, which is what happened during the civil war in an African country in the nineties.
Your first consideration is if the enemy will negotiate in good faith and if there is a track record of broken agreements then you should not talk. The second consideration is who has more to gain or lose from the talks – you or your enemy? In answer to both of these questions, the TUC, APNU, AFC and other stakeholders have a graphic record to guide them.
The PPP Government from 1999 has not negotiated in good faith and stakeholders interested in good governance, democratic reform and economic protection of the less endowed classes have nothing to show the Guyanese people.
Before Lincoln left the supermarket, I made it plain to him that I believe the struggle has gone beyond the point of talking. The TUC was represented at a national stakeholders’ meeting with President Ramotar last year and its President, Norris Witter, was quoted as praising the intentions of Mr. Ramotar. What came out of that confabulation? The answer is nothing. Can the TUC tell us what they expect from last week’s engagement?
The TUC can answer that question by looking at Parliament. APNU and the AFC have absolutely nothing to show the Guyanese people from their majority in Parliament. Here is the balance sheet. The Rohee no-confidence motion has had no effect.
The motion to remove the barricades around Parliament has been ignored by the police. Two Bills passed by Parliament will not get the presidential assent because the Executive’s interpretation of the process is that the Bills were passed by the opposition in Parliament and not Parliament. There is no such thing as an Opposition Bill.
A Bill approved by Parliament is exactly what it is – a Bill by Parliament.  Parliament’s cuts to the 2012 budget were restored by the Minister of Finance. Really! What have the AFC and APNU got from their parliamentary majority?
This same TUC, this same APNU, this same AFC have lived in this country and saw what happened just weeks ago. A commission of inquiry indicted the police for shooting to death three unarmed protestors. The Guyana Government has not ordered an investigation.
The same commission valued those three lives at eight million Guyana dollars and the Government has refused to up the amount. This same Government secretly accepted a heinous document by a Chinese company that excluded the employment of Guyanese on a project funded by the State. This same Government forcefully ordered arbitration on the union at GPL during a strike two weeks ago.
This same Government has arrogantly refused to erect a monument in honour of the 1823 Slave rebellion at a site that African stakeholders have requested. This same Government in about a week’s time will present the 2013 budget and any schoolboy will tell you it will not contain the requests of the two opposition parties.
This same Government is the same government that has behaved like this the past ten years.
Now this same Government has literally shared out the airwaves which belong to the nation of Guyana to its friends. Not even a common sense strategy was adopted, in which out of ten permits for radio and television one, just one, went to an independent operator or an applicant connected to the opposition.
The frightening dimension of this aspect of elected dictatorship is the granting of cable licences to two political friends of the government. In other words, the national airwaves are now a monopoly in the hands of the PPP and its acolytes, servants, supporters and incestuous friends.
Now the new kid on the block, Transparency Institute, is into talking, so we can get good governance and democracy. Yeah Man! Keep talking! And keep hoping!

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