Guyana enters 2015 in a state of uncertainty. President Ramotar in his New Year’s address to the nation rabbited on about all the wonderful plans his government had for the coming months without acknowledging that the nation is operating in a kind of political vacuum, and any plans he might have, therefore, are virtually meaningless. He was particularly voluble on the subject of the Amaila Falls hydropower project, which he said his government would ‘deliver’ to the Guyanese people “within months,” when financial closure would be achieved and construction would commence. The hydroelectric bill was passed in 2013 in the National Assembly with the help of the AFC, although what else would be required for the project to proceed in the absence of Parliament has yet to be spelt out.
Where the other projects Mr Ramotar listed were concerned – eg, bridging the Corentyne River, completing the road to Brazil together with its accompanying deep-water harbour, upgrading major hinterland arteries and widening major coastal highways – these were slated for his “next term of office.” Optimism aside, he gave no indication of when that return to office was likely to be.
The President prorogued Parliament on November 10 in order to avoid a no confidence vote which would have taken the country to a general election if, as widely expected, the PPP/C had lost it. In addition, he wanted to sidestep having to go for dissolution which would have produced the same result. The ruling party had already made it clear they were not prepared to hold local government polls before a national election, so that democratic avenue too was blocked off.
The government’s feeble excuse for prorogation was to create a space for dialogue with the opposition, but the Head of State had said if this did not materialise Parliament would be dissolved and a date for a general election would be named. Dialogue certainly did not happen, and the opposition made it clear it would not happen while Parliament remained prorogued. There was still no dissolution, however, because Mr Ramotar rather condescendingly told Guyanese he wanted them to enjoy their Christmas free of political tensions, but that a date would be announced early in 2015.
Christmas is over and the President, as said above, is talking blithely about what he will do in his new term, but he hasn’t let fall even a hint about when he will recall Parliament, dissolve it, and name a date for general and regional elections. (One presumes that the idea of recalling Parliament and allowing the no-confidence motion to go ahead is still anathema to the ruling party.) This has to be a source of some concern to the nation, and it leaves the PPP open to the charge that it intends to postpone those elections well down into this year and govern in autocratic mode ad interim.
How that could be achieved was outlined by commentators at the end of last year. Bearing in mind that according to the constitution a budget would have to be laid in the National Assembly within the time-frame of ninety days from the commencement of the financial year, one hypothesis was that the President would dissolve Parliament just before or during April 2015, and set the date for elections at the end of three months thereafter. (Under the constitution he has three months in which to call a general election following a dissolution.) Thereafter, the government would have a further month before the National Assembly would be required to meet, taking us potentially into August-September.
Theoretically, of course, after the passage of six months it is possible to prorogue Parliament again, although it is difficult (albeit not entirely inconceivable) to see the President and the government following this route. Apart from anything else, the problem with the time-frame of the budget would arise.
It might be noted that even if an election date were to be made public in the not-too-distant future, sufficient time would have to be allowed Gecom to do whatever was necessary – such as printing ballot papers abroad, etc – to comply with legal requirements and manage a poll efficiently.
That aside, in the meantime, here we are in the void with no information about when the government is going to make a democratic move, and with few options at the opposition’s disposal to force the ruling party’s hand. If it is indeed the case that the PPP has it in mind to postpone the general election for as long as possible, just like the late President Burnham, it will discover it will become cornered into adopting more and more totalitarian stances; it is the logic of the situation in which it finds itself. And more totalitarian stances mean greater unpopularity with the electorate, because the government simply cannot do everything itself and if it attempts this approach, it will fail. The nation needs to breathe.
As it is it has come under a torrent of criticism over prorogation both from within and without the country, and that criticism will not diminish. As Burnham found too, it becomes increasingly stressful having to withstand all those negative reviews from reputable sources, and it must be remembered that he lived during an era when absolutism in many parts of the planet was far more the norm than it is today.
The worst thing from Freedom House’s point of view is the fact that because its own self image has always been grounded in its democratic credentials, and the party is hacking away at those in an act of self mutilation, it is left without decent political principles it can claim as its own. Bereft of self esteem it flails about helplessly, and resorts to attacking everyone else as being worse than it is. It is an act of futility because that cannot restore its self respect, and in any case does little damage to all the many entities and individuals it sees as its opponents.
As for all those rosy pronouncements the President made in his New Year address, they are little better than fantasy, because nobody knows exactly in what context they are going to come about – including Amaila Falls. At this stage if he is to rescue anything at all from the fiasco, he should either recall Parliament and allow the no-confidence motion to go ahead, or else recall it to dissolve it in order to name an election date. We cannot go on in this political no-man’s land for ever.
