Dear Editor,
Unless his recent remarks regarding the High Court order issued to GECOM were made in his capacity as a private citizen, President Jagdeo must be confusing himself with a Third World dictator.
His logic seems to be that any court order which does not make sense to him need not be obeyed. This kind of thinking is generally undesirable, but particularly so when coming from the country’s President.
His reference to the benevolence of his Government in providing the $100 million to political parties for scrutinizing the house to house registration process ignores the fact that half of that sum will go to his own political party thus giving it the ability to field more scrutineers than any other party. This is the equivalent of two parents taking three children out for ice-cream, buying four cones and eating two, leaving the three children to share the remaining two ice-cream cones. If this is the President’s concept of a benevolent act then he is indeed a stingy man.
Unfortunately the issue here is not ice-cream cones. Hundreds of millions of tax-payers dollars are being spent on a registration process aimed at producing a voters’ list which is acceptable to all the political parties. An additional $100 million has been given to GECOM to help offset the expenses incurred by the political parties in scrutinizing this process. GECOM has refused to allocate any of this money to the AFC, claiming that the AFC should seek its allocation from the main opposition party, the PNC. The AFC then moved to the High Court and the High Court issued GECOM an order on how the money should be allocated. The President’s comments are not only a clear indicator of his position on the matter, but also a clear indicator of his regard for the independence of both the judiciary and GECOM.
Yours faithfully,
Dominic Gaskin