Decentralization of governmental functions would benefit Guyanese

Aug 27, 2023 Letters

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Dear Editor,

For over a century, Guyana’s colonizers centralized essential governmental authority, powers, and services in Georgetown. From there, they structured a system of domination and subordination that concentrated and legitimized decision-making in the hands of a few individuals who functioned primarily to facilitate the expropriation and exportation wealth from the colony.

Unconcerned about the development of the colony (today’s Guyana), these individuals functioned as instruments of the colonial government to control and dominate over the larger population, primarily through the inculcation of fear, intimidation, and disenfranchisement.

From its very establishment, Georgetown became the principal decision-making centre, and locus of control and domination over the scattered, rural, labouring population. As such, Guyanese perceived the city as the core of the entire country’s existence. Through the concerted processes of indoctrination, disenfranchisement, and proselytization, rural residents were cajoled into believing that the government’s apparatuses in Georgetown serve in their interests.

With independence, and the declaration of the country as a cooperative republic, Forbes Burnham, Desmond Hoyte, and Hamilton Green’s PNC continued the centralization of power and domination in Georgetown. This, they did, with contempt for decentralization, a system of governance which would have made governmental decision-making authority, power, and services accessible to the people. By their strict centralization of power, and decision-making authority, Burnham, Hoyte and Greene took turns at reproducing the inculcation of fear and intimidation through the constant promotion of distrust and indifference between Afro and Indo Guyanese. Today’s PNC leaders and sympathizers continue to promote similar patterns of divisiveness in their harassed pursuit for support and relevance.

Indisputably, the centralization of power, authority, and services benefitted policy makers, and to varying extent, residents of Georgetown and vicinity, placing rural residents at a disadvantage in readily accessing and benefitting from government services. Nevertheless, it is the surplus accrued from the labour of rural residents that provided much of the financial resources towards the services Georgetown enjoyed.

Within the last three years, the PPP/C government embarked on a campaign to bring essential government services closer to the predominantly rural population of Guyana.

An examination of the ten regions of the country reveals the government’s continued dedication in improving health services, education, housing, and infrastructure. Expansion of these services through the construction and staffing of schools, hospitals, and medical clinics in efforts to improve health and preparation for workforce participation are clearly evident. In addition, The PPP/C empowered regional leaders to make decisions and take actions on local affairs, as well as provide feedback to the government on the needs of residents.

As the PPP/C continues on its path of developing Guyana, the decentralization of essential governmental services and administrative functions need to follow – in association with local leaders’ empowerment. Although widely known, it cannot be overemphasized that the remoteness of Guyana’s scattered rural population present many challenges that make it difficult to readily access all government services.

However, in furthering its efforts to bring government and people closer, it would be worthwhile for the PPP/C to consider the establishing of Satellite Cities, or Administrative Townships in each of the regions – the beginnings of which can be seen in the development of Palmyra, Berbice industrial sector. Satellite Cities do not necessitate operations of all the functions of the central government, but should incorporate a central office/building, a sort of City/Town Hall.

City/Town Halls – instead of homes of regional ministers – would serve as permanent locations where regional leaders conduct monthly meetings, attend to regional needs, and solicit feedback from residents of all races on how best to address local problems.

Staffed with permanent employees capable of carrying out many of the civil service functions, regional City/Town Halls would also serve as the centres where many of the services currently relegated to offices in Georgetown can be readily accessed, and citizens’ concerns addressed, all at a single location. With today’s technological advances, many of the civil service functions and ministerial decisions can be carried out without necessitating local residents’ travel to Georgetown – travel which not only entails financial cost but usually result in loss of wages.

As long as Georgetown remains the central/dominant decision-making authority, the relations of rural subjugation, exploitation and marginalization will continue unabated.

In the construction of a just society where all races/ethnicities of Guyana can be equally served, the relations of power and authority, along with accompanying governmental services, need to be decentralized and accessible to everyone, irrespective of political allegiances.

Narayan Persaud, PhD

Professor Emeritus

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• Emeritus, individuals, Narayan Persaud, PhD, Professor

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