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The PPP will pay a heavy price for insulting the public

Nov 19, 2014 Letters

Dear Editor,
I am attempting to take up the challenge posed to Opposition MPs by Christopher Ram in his letter ‘The opposition should display more interest …’. In this letter and in a recent article on his blog, which was the subject of a newspaper article on November 13, 2014 Mr Ram asserts (the latter) and interprets (the former) that article 219. (1) of the Constitution (automatically) gives interim spending authority to the Government on expenditure necessary to carry on its services up to April 30, 2015 if necessary.
Re-reading the above article of the Constitution, I do not share Mr Ram’s opinion. My interpretation is that Parliamentary approval is required for any interim spending as stated.
While it may have been the practice in years gone by that the government acted on the assumption that Mr Ram does, it must be noted that firstly, it was in an environment where the Government enjoyed a parliamentary majority and secondly, what may have been a tolerant Opposition in the current Parliament. The latter situation cannot now be assumed.
If my interpretation is correct, the Government’s authority to spend would end on December 31, 2014 (excluding of course the unlawful spending they are engaged in –‘What about the unconstitutional spending that is currently taking place (SN, November 15, 2014). Spending beyond that date, therefore, would require either compliance with article 219. (1) or an Appropriations Act 2015. There is as well nothing in the Fiscal Management and Accountability Act 2003 that impinges on this imperative.
Article 219. (1) is explicit in the need for an Appropriations Act to be in place at the beginning of the financial year (1st January) but in the absence of same ‘Parliament may make provision’ for the Finance Minister to authorize conditional withdrawals from the Consolidated Fund for a period of up to four months.
Should the President, however, dissolve Parliament anytime before December 31, 2014 which he is empowered to do, then the Government can lawfully access the Consolidated Fund for up to three months thereafter ‘for the purpose of meeting expenditure on the public services’ (219. (3).
The implications of the above I believe are clear. In the current situation, article 219. (1) will ensure that the tyrannical action of President Ramotar in suspending parliamentary democracy will not last beyond December 31, 2014 and not the potentially extended timeframe that many commentators are suggesting. The Constitution is not so ‘anti-democratic’ after all.
The President may believe that by telling the media to forget about the ‘Nandlall issue’, where the Attorney General in a recorded phone conversation, reveals knowledge of a planned murderous attack on Kaieteur News during which innocent lives would be lost and of other disgusting and possibly illegal acts, that it will go away (KN,16th November).
He can be assured that it will not; the public will not forget this and numerous other scandals which this administration is guilty of and which Kaieteur News has bravely brought to light. The public is fully in support of Kaieteur News and the PPP is fooling itself that the public believes the propaganda that is peddled in the state media.
The PPP will pay a heavy price for insulting the public and for their attempts to victimize the private media for their role in exposing the industrial scale corruption and raiding of the treasury, at the upcoming general elections.
Finally it hardly needs saying that both Mr Ram and me are at one in his further caution as to the inherent risk in leaving any ‘principled work’ to the person who is now the Attorney General.
Ronald Bulkan

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