Cheddi Jagan was extremely proud of his government’s commitment to transparency and one of the most visible signs of this was his government’s ability to present the annual Auditor General’s Report after many years of default under the PNC regime. Indeed, the PPP/C has frequently leaned upon this fact as perhaps the most obvious symbol of PNC culpability and of its own commitment to openness and to stamp out the corruption that it claimed had pervaded the three decades of PNC rule. The fact that the PPP/C is willing to put this important plank of its legacy and propaganda at risk by appearing to tamper with the nature and work of the Auditor General’s Office, tells its own story and opens more space for the party to lose even greater ground at new elections.
Never again can the PPP/C stand on an election platform and proclaim that, notwithstanding the usual technical shortcomings of the annual Auditor General’s Reports, they represent an objective professional report of the nation’s accounts, and believe that such a proclamation will carry its historic level of authenticity. If, as some would have it, it was essentially its perceived corruption that caused so many of its supporters to desert it at the last elections,