APNU MP Desmond Trotman yesterday issued a stern call on Local Government Minister Norman Whittaker to “abandon the insulting and ridiculous” position that the Guyanese people are not ready for local government elections.
Last month, Whittaker had told Stabroek News that the vast majority of Guyanese were not prepared for Local Government Elections and that going ahead would be a waste of money.
Whittaker had also said that a lot more public awareness work has to be done so as to ensure that the citizenry is knowledgeable and interested enough in the polls, which were last held in 1994. He said that he will give the order for local government elections when the Guyana Elections Commission says it is ready.
As the second day of the budget debate got underway, Trotman reiterated what he said during a debate on the Local Government Amendment Elections Bill several weeks ago “people want garbage- free communities, they want qualified administrators capable of quick, efficient responses to flood and deteriorating health situations and they want to elect their own officials. What they don’t want are hand-picked hacks and dunderheads who are incapable of recognizing their nose hole from their posterior and more importantly they are fed up with the Minister’s presence and his micro management of the system.”
The opposition recently used its majority in the National Assembly to pass an amendment that calls for the holding of the polls before August 1, 2014. Although government tabled the bill for the postponement of the polls to a date on or before December 1, 204, it did not support it as amended by the opposition.
Trotman charged that the current central Government regime, saturated with the socialist tenets of democratic centralism, has seen it fit to wage war against the Local Government organs.
He called for the “assault on the Local Government system in Guyana to come to an end” and for the Presidential assent to local Government reform legislation to be completed and for the elections to take place this year.
Speaking on the performance of the Local Government Ministry in 2012 and 2013, he said that it has left much to be desired, “…when one examines the functioning of the Ministry, the inescapable conclusion which will be arrived at is that the Ministry has not been operating within the boundaries of the law.”
On the 5% growth rate that was announced by Finance Minister Ashni Singh in his budget presentation, Trotman argued that this “was to be expected since the country is rising from a very low economic base. But permit me to state that if we (APNU) were fortunate enough to have good governance, instead of the current perversion, the economy would probably have grown by 10%, no less.”
He charged that under this current Government, this is not possible partly because bad governance results in poor project choice, corrupt contracting of incompetents and distortion of economic decision making.
According to Trotman, “drug proceeds have been pouring into Guyana and construction and other commercial activities have been the beneficiaries without any major arrests of the money launderers.”
This statement caused an uproar in the House with Minister of Housing Irfaan Ali who took umbrage to the statement. “If the honourable member can provide evidence to justify…he is out of context. There are many hard working Guyanese…! am calling on him to provide the evidence.” Attorney General Anil Nandlall also chimed in that the statement was “very irresponsible.”
Speaker of the National Assembly Raphael Trotman told Ali that “the member did not name anyone…he did not say whether 10% or 90% of the sector was affected…He suggested that there is some illicit proceeds of narcotics…I believe that the statements were general enough.”
Regarding Region 8, Desmond Trotman asserted that despite the many contributions that the Region has been making to Guyana’s coffers, it continues to be denied the degree of financial support from Central Government. “The reality is that life in that Region, especially for people in sub region 1, is a far cry from what it should be.”
He posited that Government should make moves to adopt a more “even-handed approach in respect to the developmental needs of the people in that and other hinterland regions.”
Further, he added that Singh’s budget presentation has nothing new, but was a mere regurgitation of issues in the 2012 and 2013 with the usual boast made at the end of each presentation that the budget was “Guyana’s largest budget ever.”
