The decline and fall of the People’s Progressive Party

May 10, 2015 APNU Column, Features / Columnists

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The People’s Progressive Party is sliding towards a fall from power in the 2015 general and regional elections. It has been in decline for several years as its ‘core’ supporters deserted the Party in disgust. Its leaders are exhausted. Its energy has been expended. Its ideas have expired. Its electoral support is evaporating.
The PPP’s performance in general and regional elections has been declining over the past eighteen years. The trend is clear to see. The PPP claimed 220, 667 votes in the controversial 1997 general and regional elections. Its tally fell to 210,013 in 2001. It then fell to 182,156 in 2006. It finally crashed to 166, 340 in 2011 when it lost its majority in the National Assembly to A Partnership for National Unity and the Alliance For Change.
The PPP, when its seven-year tenure from 1957 to 1964 is added to its nearly 23 years in office since 1992, has wielded executive power over the people of this country for 30 years.  Through its five consecutive presidencies – of Cheddi Jagan; Samuel Hinds; Janet Jagan; Bharrat Jagdeo and, now, Donald Ramotar –PPP rule has become increasingly unbearable. Its one-party domination of the country has damaged democracy, divided the population and impaired development.
The exact date that the decline started was 11th August 1999 when Bharrat Jagdeo replaced Janet Jagan as President after a constitutional fandango. Jagdeo, despite his boastful behaviour and swaggering style, was the author of the PPP’s problems, losing over 54, 000 votes from Janet Jagan’s assumed tally in 1997. His tenure ended in 2011 after the failure of ineffective manoeuvres to seek a new term of office.
The PPP during the Jagdeo era persistently failed to address the people’s basic needs for public services and embarked instead on a series of expensive but misconceived mega-projects such as the Fibre Optic Cable Project, the Specialty Surgical Hospital and the Amaila Falls Hydro-power Project road. Jagdeo’s successor, President Donald Ramotar, was obliged to cancel contracts for all of these projects after the loss of billions of dollars.
The PPP tried to subordinate the National Assembly to the Executive branch of government. It undermined the independence and impartiality of the Public Service and the Security Services. It impaired regulatory and law-enforcement agencies – such as the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit; the Environmental Protection Agency and the Guyana Energy Agency – by depriving them of adequate assets, equipment and finance to such an extent as to diminish their capability to function effectively. It cultivated the state-owned communications media – the Government Information Agency, Guyana National Newspapers Limited (publishers of the Guyana Chronicle) and the National Communications Network – as Party organs to systematically exclude dissenting opinions.
The PPP, now in its 30th year in office, failed to address the country’s most pressing problem – the public security crisis. The Party never accepted its responsibility for the high rate of armed robberies, the murderous maritime piracy, the rampant gun-running and contraband smuggling and other violent crimes that rage along the coastland.
The entire nation is alarmed at the rising homicide rate. There have been more than 2,100 murders over the past 15 years during the two deadly Jagdeo and Ramotar presidencies. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime lists Guyana’s 2010 homicide rate as the fourth highest murder rate in South America. Guyana’s murder rate is three times higher than that of the United States.
The PPP failed to advance local democracy by destroying neighbourhood democratic councils and delaying local government elections. It failed to maintain educational standards which are now characterised by poor performance from the level of primary schools to the university. The Party has lost the trust and confidence, even of its staunch supporters.
Ramotar’s personal unpopularity and political underperformance has now outpaced all previous presidents. The Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) confirmed widely-held perceptions about Guyana’s President. The Report determined that there had been a decline in Ramotar’s approval rating and an increase in the number of those who think the economy worsened in 2014[Stabroek News 19th November 2014].
Ramotar’s prorogation of parliament on 10th November 2014 enraged the nation and international community. His ‘Proclamation’ effectively paralysed the parliamentary process and smothered the voices of the people’s legitimate representatives in the National Assembly – an affront to the Guyanese electorate who, in November 2011, voted for A Partnership for National Unity and the Alliance for Change to have the majority of seats in the National Assembly. He had earlier displayed gross disrespect for the National Assembly by refusing to assent to several bills which the Assembly had approved.
Ramotar’s brief presidency has been plagued by a wave of angry public protests. These occurred on the coastland from paddy farmers, public servants, university lecturers, human rights activists and other groups. There were also protests in hinterland communities from the Indigenous people living there and in Bartica, Mabaruma, Mahdia, Lethem and Port Kaituma. The result is that the PPP is now facing a ‘tsunami’ of troubles which grows more threatening by the day.
The PPP does not seem to understand that it has failed. It has failed to transform Guyana into a united, modern, democratic state. It has failed to embrace the common good. It cannot escape the inevitable fall from power when general and regional elections are held tomorrow, 11th May 2015.

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