Dear Editor,
As our country’s economy continues to spiral downwards the working people will be the hardest hit. The government, notwithstanding its 2017 Budget platitudes and promises has failed to grapple with the economy’s downturn. The economy is slowly but surely approaching a recession with economic, social and political crises looming not too far on the horizon.
The government is fighting a losing battle on several fronts. On the economic front it has finally admitted that foreign direct investments are low. Go-Invest has become No-Invest. And the much touted economic diplomacy retrofitted from the PPP/C administration is floundering and has virtually lost its way.
Everywhere in Guyana the cry is common: ‘business is bad’ and ‘no money ain’t circulating’. On the street people have branded the government as one of ‘rules and regulations’. Somehow it has not penetrated the skulls of those in government that the economic and social conditions of the working people are deteriorating and moving from bad to worse. For the government, the way out of its financial morass is to heap more and more taxes on the people.
During the 2017 Budget debate almost every speaker from the government benches characterized punishment of the people as ‘resilience’ by the people. President Granger unabashedly makes constant references to the era of Burnham in glowing terms. He makes no bones of his admiration for the man who was responsible for the disastrous situation that brought his country to its knees and later, delivered our country into the strangling embrace of the international financial institutions under the Hoyte administration.
Persons who once wrote in glowing terms about the APNU+AFC soon after their assumption to office no longer do so. It is a sign that the government’s credibility is waning. Many in the private sector who thought that life would change for the better after May 2015 are thinking differently now.
On the political front, the masses of people on the streets are calling for the scrapping of the parking meters in the city of Georgetown have surprised many who felt that the government was on solid ground. For the people, city council and central government have become indistinguishable.
Popular protests in Guyana and other Caricom countries are manifestations of the frustrations of the working people in these countries. The economies in most Caricom member states are not doing well. And the crime situation is biting hard so much that in one member state the opposition has called for a state of emergency to be declared.
It is therefore fortuitous that an Inter-sessional meeting of the Caribbean Community is being held at this time in Guyana. Every head of government of the Caribbean Community on assuming the chairmanship of that body brings to it an agenda of his or her preference. Usually the agenda is reflective of the problems they face on the home front. President Granger’s assumption of the chairmanship of the community will be no different. Two of the items high on the agenda of the Inter-sessional Summit are reflective of the President’s priorities at home: crime and security.
The other agenda items are common to the other member states. These are not new issues.
Take, for example, the twin issue of crime and security. Some years ago during the Jagdeo presidency a Caricom Summit on crime and security was held in Port of Spain under the chairmanship of the late Prime Minister Patrick Manning. At that meeting, a raft of recommendations submitted by Caricom IMPACS was submitted and agreed for implementation by member states. I attended that Summit along with President Jagdeo.
On our return to Guyana within a matter of months almost all the security-related decisions were implemented, including the controversial Interception of Communications Bill. For Guyana, the only matter that was left unresolved was the Caricom Arrest Warrant Treaty which, up to this day, has not been agreed to by all the member states because the draft bill formulated by the Secretariat was not acceptable to some member states.
Further, differences between member states on financial contributions to and the role of IMPACS stymied implementation of the community’s crime and security agenda. The OECS member states which along with Barbados, constitute the Regional Security System (RSS) were unwilling to finance IMPACS. After all, they already had the RSS. Barbados, however, held a different position because all the regional security institutions were based on that island.
At a follow-up meeting held in Paramaribo, Suriname a representative of an OECS member state was quoted as saying that the benefits reaped from its bilateral relations with the US Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) had brought more benefits to his country than IMPACS ever would. The conclusion was obvious to all.
A multilateral solution to the crime and security problematic continues to elude Caricom. For domestic political reasons, member states seem more disposed to address the problem at the national level. They are torn between the high financial cost on the one hand and the high social and economic cost of not doing it on the other. This is the challenge that continues to confront heads of government at meeting after meeting. No solution seems to be in sight.
The Secretary General of the community recently posed the question: “Imagine if Caricom was not there?” The Secretary General must be reminded of the phenomenal Brexit vote as well as the serious threat of a break-up of the European Union. People are beginning to ask serious questions and while some politicians are listening, others are not.
It is indeed time for change. This time it must be real change, revolutionary change.
Yours faithfully,
Clement J Rohee
