Guyana’s unpreparedness for self-governance is on full display

Jun 19, 2014 Letters

DEAR EDITOR,
We need drastic changes in Guyana now, but it will not happen. Not before the country ends up in total ruins. In this context, we speak of the absolute need for this racially polarized, politically bifurcated country to come together to avoid complete collapse.
We need an end to nepotism and corruption, a reduction in crime, murders and domestic violence, a decrease in police brutality and drug trafficking, a 10% salary increase across the board for all workers, a monthly pension of $15,000 for our senior citizens and a 2% reduction in VAT. The passage of a Bill in Parliament to lower the toll on the Berbice Bridge is a positive start, but the PPP’s absolute refusal to support the Bill clearly shows that it does not want to help the people, most of whom are their supporters in Berbice.
The people should not live in fear of the police, armed bandits and gang warfare. Our sons and daughters who are at New Opportunity Corps (NOC) should not be abused by the very people whose care they are under.
Guyana has been sliding downhill for the past 48 years, with accelerated decline during the past 14 years under the Jagdeo/Ramotar regime. Guyana’s condition is starkly revealed by the desperate calls from the opposition and the business community for foreign intervention to reduce Guyana’s high crime rate which has been an accepted norm.
Guyana’s pathetic unpreparedness for self-governance is on full display. No local government elections in 20 years, no plan/strategy to fight crime, corruption and drug trafficking, and to develop the economy. The only plan the regime has in place is to use the state resources to enrich themselves, friends and relatives.
It is the business of the government to protect the people of Guyana. A country’s politics is the major determinant in the quality of its civilization, its security and future economic and social viability. Politics springs from a country’s culture or lack of it. In every nation the power of politics is for good or evil. The United States became a superpower because of its Constitution that, inter alia, allowed for the kind of representation that ensured supervision of the executive, freedom of expression and the right to live as free people. The Soviet Union collapsed because of a lack of freedom of expression which it replaced with repression and alienation of the people from the corridors of power.
Our politics has failed us miserably in a nation that is congenitally impaired. Our deformed Constitution and its crude articles have trapped our politics in elementariness and tribalism from which it is yet to emerge, as the state of our main political parties reveals. Guyana’s politics have never demanded or inspired genuine caring, courage and commitment on the part of the leaders of the two main parties. Their circus of campaigning is funded by financiers whose importance has increased with the intellectual bankruptcy of the parties. Today, money is the real power that governs the country.
The leaders of the PPP ought to recognize that it is their politics that has brought Guyana to this sorry state, when it should have liberated, elevated and protected them. Had the politics been strong, all else would have had to follow suit. But sustained political shallowness on the part of the ruling cabal will lead to the ruin of Guyana. This is already evident in the poor services at the public hospitals, the collapsing of UG and the near demise of the public schools and the total let down of the youths and the elderly by the Ministry of Social Security. That is the tragic condition the people have found themselves in. So entrenched is the political impoverishment in this country that its demise is at hand and the people can do nothing about it.
As the ruling party, the PPP has a solemn responsibility to save the country. It must shoulder the responsibility for where the nation finds itself today.
Dr. Asquith Rose and Harish Singh

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