How democratic is local government?

Jul 27, 2018 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

---

Politics is ‘politricks’. You expect the Opposition to be critical of the government; you expect the government to be regularly patting itself on the back.
True to form, the government was patting itself on the back at the launching of an old discredited forum, known as the National Conference of Local Democratic Organs (NCLDO).
The NCLDO is an old communist relic of the past, patterned after the Cuban system, and which was regularly held during the rule of Forbes Burnham, only that back then it was called the Local Congress of Local Democratic Organs.
The AFC+APNU government was in its element at yesterday’s gathering. At the forum, the government boasted about its role in the restoration of local democracy. It spoke about respecting the autonomy of local democratic organs and about making them less dependent on government.
But what really is the state of local government today? How much has changed since local government elections were held in 2016? And how much influence is the government still wielding over local democratic organs?
The government says that by holding local government elections after an absence of more than twenty years, means that it restored local democracy. What the government does not admit is it shared culpability in the non-holding of local government elections during the PPPC rule.
The PNCR cannot disclaim its share of responsibility for the non-holding of local government elections. The PNC did not hold local government elections from 1970 until 1994. And the reason is that the PNC was quite comfortable with dominating every inch of the political space in the country.
The PNCR also cannot absolve itself of responsibility for the non-holding of local government elections after 1994, because it was the PNCR and the PPPC which were bogged down in differences over the type of electoral system which should employed. The PNCR wanted a 60/40 split between constituency and PR representation and the PPPC wanted the reverse. But because the PPPC was in power, it is convenient to heap all the blame of the deadlock in negotiations on the government side.
The fact of the matter is that the present 50-50 split still allows for the main political parties to dominate local government elections. If the APNU+AFC is truly interested in putting power into the hands of the people, it would allow for a full constituency system for local government elections. But the two main parties know that if they agree to this, it would slacken the grip they have on local government.
The APNU+AFC government makes claim to wanting local democratic organs to be autonomous. Really?
The appointment of Regional Executive Officers (REOs) is being used to strangle the autonomy of Regional Democratic Councils. There are many cases in which the REOs are acting as laws onto themselves and at the behest of the administration.
If the government is serious about local government autonomy, it would allow the regions to appoint their own REOs, rather than impose these persons on the regional democratic councils. The government is wielding control and frustrating the work of regional government through its control over Regional Executive Officers.
All governments, PNC, PPPC and APNU+AFC, have been very comfortable keeping local government weak. They are comfortable in having the navel strings of local democratic organs tied to the government. All these governments have been more concerned with control rather than autonomy.
The fortunes of local democratic organs have not changed because of local government elections. The local democratic organs are still limited in what they can do. They do not enjoy independence as is being claimed, and the main reason for this is that they are unable to stand alone on their feet.
Some municipalities such as Georgetown and Bartica are benefitting from the largesse of the government. Bartica has been most fortunate, since it is attracting the support of government, and because of this, has secured international financing for a number of projects. But this support by the government has not extended to all the municipalities, another example of how controlling the government has been.
The PNCR has also been frustrating the work of at least two Regional Democratic Councils, by having its members disturb meetings which then have to be aborted. If the PNCR was really serious about local democracy, it would discourage this practice of bullyism.
Unless local democratic organs can be liberated from government control, all the talk about local democracy is hogwash. If the government is serious about local democracy, it would change the local government electoral system to dispense with the domination by the main political parties; give full freedom to local authorities to increases rates and taxes, and allow the councils to elect their own Regional Executive Officers.

---

---