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An aberration of the democratic process

Jun 23, 2013 Letters

Dear Editor,
There is a saying that everyone is entitled to their own opinions but not to their own facts. Facts are indeed stubborn things. They cannot be erased or wished away, even though there are some who sought to distort our political history by commenting on matters over which, at best they are not familiar with or at worst they deliberately seek to distort out of narrow partisan interests.
One writer with claim to academic credentials went as far as to say that it was his considered opinion that the APNU won the plurality in the last general elections without providing one iota of evidence to substantiate his view.
One undisputed fact is that the PPP is the only political party that have always won either a plurality or an outright majority in all free and fair elections held in Guyana since the 1950’s until this day. It is common knowledge that all elections from 1968 to 1985 were blatantly and massively rigged by the PNC and therefore could not be regarded as a true expression of the political preferences of the Guyanese electorate.
It was not until the restoration of democracy on 0ctober 1992 that the true political preferences of the electorate were finally known after  lots of speculation regarding relative strengths of political parties. The October 5 1992 elections shattered the hopes and political aspirations of several opposition parties.
The PNC, WPA and the DLM became victims of the democratic processes the latter having never recovered and pushed into political oblivion. The WPA was relegated into the political backwaters until it finally morphed into a new political entity known as APNU which with the support of the AFC now enjoy a one-seat majority in parliament.
What is manifesting itself today is an aberration of the democratic process in which two minority political entities are behaving as though they have a divine right to overrule the party with the largest popular support as a consequence of their combined one-seat majority.
Such thinking is not only flawed but anti-developmental and could derail the democratic aspirations of the Guyanese people. It is this first-pass-the post principle that rendered the westminster model of political representation superior to that of the proportional representation which was imposed by the British Government in the elections of 1964 with disastrous consequences.
Hydra Ally

 

 

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