The Working Peoples Alliance (WPA) yesterday called for a more vigorous campaign by the opposition against the suspension of parliament, cautioning that momentum is being lost. “What is evident is that there is urgent need for the opposition to communicate to the Guyanese public an Action Plan or Road Map for making the Government so uncomfortable that it would be forced to relent and reconvene Parliament any time soon,” the WPA said in a statement yesterday. The WPA is a member of the opposition coalition A Partnership of National Unity (APNU) but at times, its views have differed from those of the coalition on actions taken.
In its statement, the WPA said that the party strongly favours a more vigorous campaign by the opposition against the prolongation of the proroguing of Parliament. “Since the prorogue proclamation on November 10, the reaction of the Opposition, besides expressions of outrage at the absurdity of a minority Executive President dismissing the Parliament (in which the Opposition has a majority), the rape of democracy and the instituting of dictatorship, has focused on: writing letters of complaint to regional bodies and international agencies, meeting with locally based diplomats and civil society organisations, TV appearances of one sort or another, issuing statements to the local and regional media, APNU’s mass rally on November 14 and its weekly Tuesday protests outside the Office of the President,” it observed.
On November 10, Ramotar suspended Parliament triggering the country’s worst political crisis since the 2011 general elections. His government has not been able to mobilise support for its move. The AFC, whose motion of no confidence against the government was thwarted by the prorogation, and APNU have both insisted that there will be no talks with the Ramotar administration unless Parliament is recalled.
The WPA said that the AFC has so far been conspicuously absent from the firing line, except for a guest appearance at the APNU rally of November 14. “Momentum is being lost and reaction to the Government’s derailing of the No-Confidence Motion appears to be protest in slow motion,” the WPA observed.
“What is not emerging is a definitive game plan, a meaningful action plan for implementing decisions relating thereto, and a clear conceptualization of the end game that signals victory for the people and defeat for the usurpers of power,” the WPA asserted. The statement noted that a flyer was distributed at the rally of November 14 which urged the public to join “the Civil Disobedience Campaign to Have Parliament Restored” but none of the speakers addressed this issue in a direct and robust manner. The speeches failed to communicate a common message of resistance and a call to battle stations, the party said.
The WPA asserted that there is urgent need for the opposition to communicate to the Guyanese public an action plan or road map for making the government so uncomfortable that it would be forced to relent and reconvene Parliament any time soon. “There had been talk of taking the struggle to every city, town and village, but so far agitation has been confined to inner George-town. The ongoing and incomplete engagements with the labour unions, the private sector and civil society need to be speeded up and have not so far yielded practical commitments to widen the movement of resistance,” it observed.
The WPA said that if after a few weeks’ activity of picketing, consultations and press releases have elapsed, and the government remains obdurate and entrenched, then the next and more intensive phase of the action plan should include marches and mass mobilization so as to prevent the supremacy of Parliament being trampled under “the deadening boots of Executive paramountcy.”
Any meaningful road map would need to include taking to the streets at the appropriate stage of the struggle, the WPA declared. “Those who say marches, as against supposedly less threatening public meetings and picket action, will make APNU and AFC less able to win over significant numbers of traditional Government supporters must also realize that inaction may cause the Opposition to lose some of its hard core, but extremely frustrated voters, through abstention,” the party asserted.
According to the statement, the end game is presumably, to force government to quickly end prorogation, reconvene Parliament, submit itself to a no-confidence motion, and go to elections. There is still an opinion in APNU circles that priority should be given to local government elections over general and regional elections, the WPA said, but added that “well, boat gone a-falls and the clamour among sizeable sections of the public is for general elections.”
It cautioned that the political work does not stop here and there is no point in retaining the discredited and divisive “winner take all” system after the next elections.
“In this regard, there is need to struggle for a stabilizing five year term of national unity govern-ment, based on the votes of the people, in which the Party with the largest number of votes wins the presidency, the party with the second largest number of votes is awarded the prime ministerial position, and the third largest party the speakership, along with an all-party cabinet, and with all the outstanding commissions and checks and balances be-coming activated. During this transitional period, the constitution should undergo additional and more radical revision, including further reduction of presidential powers, completion of the electoral system reforms of 1999, and allowing parties to form a coalition government after elections,” the WPA asserted.
