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CIVIL SOCIETY IS SHOOTING ITSELF IN THE FOOT!

Oct 06, 2015 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

School children have enough problems memorizing the names of those new ministries that have been created by the government. So please, do not ask them to name the junior ministers of the government.
These ministers are becoming increasingly invisible with each passing day. The limelight always seems to be on the President and the other senior ministers.
Everyone seems to want a piece of the President. One day he is at the United Nations. The next day he is planting a tree in Bartica. The man does not seem to get any rest.
It is the same with some ministers. Somebody is opening a business and they want to have the President and the Prime Minister and senior ministers present.  Some of these functions are of limited public interest. Sometimes they are organized for free publicity. The media should begin to charge the organizers for coverage of some of these things.
Ministers should learn to decline some of the invitations they receive. Some people and organizations feel that they are too important and that is why they always want some top official of the government at functions they are organizing.
Far too much of these ministers’ time is being taken up having to attend some function or event. They should be spending more time in their ministries. Instead they have to attend some function.
Somebody needs to step in and say enough. Invite somebody else but not a minister. Leave the ministers to do their job. If you must have a minister, then invite a junior minister.
The pictures and names of these ministers need to appear more often in the newspaper; on the television and on the radio because this is the only way the school children are going to become familiar with them.
You would think that instead of trying to have the senior ministers and the President at an event those extending the invitation would invite the junior ministers. After all, they are not regularly in the public spotlight and there can hardly be any harm in asking them to be in attendance.
But no, it seems as if it always has to be the Prime Minister, the President or some senior Minister. And whatever is being held has to be in the newspapers. Some of the organizations, agencies and businesses which are hosting these events should really be paying the newspapers and television stations for advertisement space because they are gaining publicity free of cost.
But why invite government officials? What about civil society? If the private sector has a function, why does it usually want a government official to speak? Why not invite someone from within its own ranks who can give a technical perspective on an issue?
The reason why civil society is so weak in Guyana is not because government is marginalizing this grouping. The reason why it is so weak is because civil society is shooting itself in the foot.
A civil society organization is hosting an event and who do you think they choose to be the feature guest? You guessed right, a minister. Yet there are so many persons from within civil society who can take the place of the minister.
There are a lot of persons out there with a lot of experience and expertise. They, like some of our junior ministers, are invisible. They are not known. Yet, instead of making them known, civil society organizations are playing to galleries. They want the publicity instead of giving their civil society colleagues.
Can you therefore blame the ruling coalition for bypassing members of civil society from representation in parliament? Can you blame them for bypassing civil society from appointments to public office?
If civil society is bypassing its own members, why should the government do any better?

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