The governing APNU+AFC coalition’s prime ministerial candidate Khemraj Ramjattan has defended the use of state resources including a Guyana Defence Force (GDF) helicopter and the live streaming capabilities of the Department of Information (DPI) for their elections campaign, calling it the “advantage of incumbency.”
“It is ridiculous to make the argument that a president of a country cannot use state resources to get him to one end of the country. It’s also ludicrous to make that point that it is abuse of state resources. He’s president of Guyana until another president is sworn in and if he wants to use the helicopter there is nothing wrong about that,” Ramjattan said in response to questions posed by this newspaper at a news conference last Thursday.
President David Granger has used a GDF helicopter to attend a rally, while the DPI has live-streamed some of the coalition’s campaign events.
Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, Ramjattan, also the Minister of Public Security, argued that use of state resources “is the norm of every other democracy I know.”
Ramjattan made specific mention of US President Donald Trump, who, during his current re-election bid, utilises state resources, including the presidential aircraft, Air Force One.
Trump’s use of these resources would fall under the provisions of the US Presidential Public Funding Programme. This programme, administered by the Federal Election Commission, provides all eligible presidential candidates with government funds to pay for the qualified expenses of their political campaigns in both the primary and general elections.
Guyana does not have a similar programme.
“I do not now have to use my private vehicle to go where I need to when campaigning. I use the ministry vehicle,” Ramjattan said, before adding that for him the line for abuse of state funds does not include transportation services.
“The line is taking monies for purposes of a political party project but you can use vehicles,” the minister explained.
Asked which side of the line the use of DPI falls, Ramjattan said it, too, was “an advantage of incumbency.”
In 2012, 2013 and 2014, the then opposition AFC and APNU both used their combined majority to cut the budgets of the state-run NCN and the DPI’s forerunner, the Government Information Agency (GINA), while labelling them “propaganda” outfits for the then PPP/C-led government.
In the year before they won office, both APNU and AFC parliamentarians said they could not approve funding for NCN or GINA, for which they said the government was using taxpayers’ money for politically partisan purposes. “The government is aware that we have problems with the use of taxpayers’ money to subsidise entities used for partisan political purposes… and they have refused to democratise them,” then AFC MP Moses Nagamootoo told the Committee of Supply in 2014.
Ramjattan himself had said then that there needed to be “a radical transformation” of the agencies.
Ramjattan is the second member of the administration to address concerns about the use of state resources during the current campaign season.
Over a week ago, campaign co-chair Joseph Harmon denied using state funds.
“It’s a ridiculous assertion… because we are not using the state’s funds,” Harmon declared on the sidelines of the coalition’s manifesto launch, which was live-streamed by staff of the DPI.
Additionally, government ministers and officials have recently been presiding over the commissioning of state-funded projects and the award of grants while dressed in campaign wear.
Meanwhile, Harmon further said that the funds being used for the coalition’s campaign for the March 2nd polls “are funds which we have raised as a result of persons who [see in] the programmes which we are embracing a future for Guyana and want to invest in that future.”
The APNU+AFC coalition had promised as part of its 2015 manifesto to formulate new campaign financing regulations and devise a legal framework for registration of political parties. However, this was not done.
Ahead of the last general elections, Granger, then the opposition leader, had accused the former government of engaging in “squandermania” as part of its campaign.
“The People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) administration has started its elections campaign with a massive spending spree of state funds. The squandermania is aimed unapologetically at winning votes from constituents and communities which the PPP/C has neglected for years,” Granger told a press conference in September 2014.
In January, 2015, he said the opposition was concerned about the use of state media and funds from the state that are being used as campaign tools and which gave the incumbent an electoral advantage.
The roles have since been reversed as opposition leader Bharrat Jagdeo has accused Granger similarly.
“The Chronicle is the campaign arm of APNU funded by taxpayers. NCN and other state media are the same thing. The government information network is the same thing, DPI they call it now,” he said.
