BRING IT ON!

Jul 18, 2021 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – On the face of it, the no-confidence motions tabled by the Opposition would appear to be meaningless and counterproductive. Even if the motions are allowed, they will have no effect; and it is hard to understand how the Opposition stands to benefit from these motions.
But there is a subscript which may not have been considered, even by the authors of these motions. The debate on the motions can be very instrumental in determining the outcome of the elections at the forthcoming Congress of the People’s National Congress Reform and of the Alliance For Change.
The no-confidence motions were tabled against the Minister of Health and the Minister of Home Affairs. When these motions come up for debate, the PPP/C is likely going to use them to score maximum political points against the records of the former Ministers of Public Health and Ministers of Public Security.
The PPP/C is likely to convert the no-confidence debates into an indictment of the management of the health and public security sectors under the APNU+AFC. Instead of the PPP/C one-year rule being under the microscope, it will be the APNU+AFC’s management of the health and public security sector, which will be under the spotlight.
Some of the criticisms have already been made during the Budget debates. But it is likely to be intensified if there is the debate of the no-confidence motions.
The APNU likes to remind Guyanese that when it left office, there were only 20 coronavirus-related deaths and a mere 474 cases. Since then the numbers of deaths have increased to more than 500 and the infections have surpassed 21,000.
But the APNU+AFC’s low coronavirus death rate and infection rate cannot stand scrutiny. The pandemic was in its early stages; the country was at a virtual standstill because of the elections crisis and the closure of non-essential businesses and the testing rate was abysmally low – fewer than 70 tests were being done per day.
Just before the APNU+AFC demitted office, the infection rate and the death rate had begun to increase. The graphs of total cases and deaths were virtually flat-lined up to the end of June but from July began to rise.
The increases in cases and deaths did not begin with the PPP/C regime but rather with the APNU+AFC and its six-phase reopening plan, which was announced on 17th June, 2020. Between June and July, the total number of deaths increased by 66.7 percent and the number of cases, in an environment of low testing, by 68 percent.
The PPP/C has essentially gone along with the six- phase reopening plan. As such, the argument can be made compellingly that if the APNU had stuck to its original plan and had increased testing, the results would not have been much different than what obtains today.
But the PPP/C also has ammunition which will stagger the APNU+AFC. It can point to it inheriting a non-operable and ill-equipped National Infectious Hospital; the lines to supply the hospital with oxygen were not installed despite the grand reopening of the institution before the APNU+AFC demitted office.
The PPP/C will malign the APNU+AFC for its low levels of testing. And it will have a chance to produce the evidence to back up its previous accusations of underreporting of deaths.
If defending the management of the pandemic is going to prove embarrassing to the APNU+AFC, imagine how more daunting will be the task of defending its record in the public security sector.
The APNU+AFC government has a far from impressive record when it comes to public security. Seventeen prisoners died and the Georgetown Prisons was burnt to the ground under the APNU+AFC; and the problems at Lusignan did not start under the PPP/C
The APNU+AFC says that drug trafficking and piracy were down when it was in office. But it was under the Coalition that the most horrific piracy event took place, resulting in the government having to declare a National Day of Mourning.
The no-confidence motions tabled by the APNU+AFC are therefore likely to raise a hornet’s nest. The motions will backfire against the Coalition.
But when it comes to the internal politics of both the PNC/R and the AFC, there is some political capital to be gained. The no confidence debates will virtually bring to an end the prospects of one particular candidate challenging for the leadership of the PNC/R.
So negative will be the fallout from the debate and so strident will be the criticisms of that candidate that the person will have to abandon any prospects of running for the leadership of the PNC/R. And the same will happen within the AFC.
As strange as it may sound, the victims of the no-confidence motions will NOT be of the PPP/C. Those likely to lose support will likely be persons within the PNC/R and the AFC.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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