The PPP Govt. must stop resorting to brute force to get its way

Aug 07, 2021 Letters

Dear Editor,

The COVID-19 vaccination process should be done by way of informed consent not by way of the rabid anti-working-class tactic of criminalising model working-class Guyanese citizens by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP Government).
Dismissing workers, sending home workers without pay. It is only the GTU General Secretary Coretta Mc. Donald who has stood up against these tyrannical impositions that take the food off of the tables of many families while it restricts and contains our freedom of movement. Next, it will be mandatory for pensioners to produce vaccination passbooks to get their pension. On the other hand, the maximum leaders of the PPP continue to shield themselves behind Article 80 of the Guyana Constitution, immune from prosecution stemming from charges brought against them before and while in office. Simply put, most people do not trust the PPP.
Long before the party “set foot” in office on August 2 2020, they had known:
1) That the party had not the expertise nor the administrative ability to govern Guyana singlehandedly; 2) that it had not the political will to stand up in defense of Guyana’s Sovereignty and had given away our Kaieteur and Canje Blocks in the past and now once again in office, they are paying ExxonMobil and the other oil consortiums to exploit our oil resources; 3) that they had not the capacity to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic singlehandedly, and if they had any interest in the welfare of Guyana, they would have created a broad-based Task Force made up of a wide cross-section of trustworthy Guyanese out of Civil Society, Churches, Trade Unions, NGOs, communities and opposition parties, etc. If they had done so, there would not have been the willful loss of hundreds of lives; and transparency and accountability in procurement of Covid-19 vaccines.
But the PPP took advantage of the situation and sought to delude Guyanese, skillfully manipulated its support base, divided the population, and with the private sector politicised, in the oil/gas era, it showed its true colours. They used COVID-19 as a smokescreen to cover-up their crooked deals with ExxonMobil with the intention of creating the gas-to-shore project and many others to ensure that Guyanese don’t benefit in any possible way that would bring this poverty-stricken nation out of poverty. They are faced with increasing pressure from a wide cross-section of Guyanese at home and abroad to renegotiate the oil contract with the oil companies so that Guyanese can benefit. The daily reports in the two major newspapers, the Kaieteur News (KN), and the Stabroek News (SN) of the secrecy, confidentiality and skullduggery between the Guyana Government, ExxonMobil and its partners; the inevitable oil spills and environmental impact and Guyana having no insurance coverage has caused the PPP to crack up and to return to its old destructive dictatorial ways.
It is now left to be seen whether the ABC+E countries that vigilantly stood by Guyana’s side to ensure the preservation of our electoral democracy, are now going to move to enforce sanctions on the delinquent PPP Government now that it is derailing our fragile democracy. After one year, the PPP has refused and continue to deny Guyanese of Civil Society our Constitutional Right to inclusive governance and to be part of the Covid-19 Task Force, to interface with Guyanese communities and address people’s concerns, who are eligible to be vaccinated.
Vaccination should be based on informed consensus, rather than have the PPP resort to brute force and ignorance, draconian legislations and the use of the repressive state apparatus to consolidate its dictatorship under the smokescreen of the COVID-19 regulations and measures.

Yours faithfully
Desmond Alli (General Secretary Guyana United Artists GUA)

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