Dear Editor,
Your lead story yesterday carried a picture of three former presidents and the current president, with this headline: “Constitutional, electoral reforms should be ‘people driven’”. It has inspired me to make the following comment.
Guyana is a very racially divided society. Voting racially for parties that are perceived ethnic/racial is the problem. A Washington Post reporter once told me (1990): “In Guyana, down to the last man, they vote race”. And, further said, “In such a society it is very difficult to have genuine democracy”.
So I make this proposal for consideration: Let candidates from each of Guyana’s 53 Electoral Districts (EDs) run in a district election for a seat in the 53-member parliament. They must do so on their own popularity and funds raised in their ED. No endorsements from PPP or PNC. They must be held accountable to their districts’ voters.
Let the 53-members so elected vote to appoint a Prime Minister who shall appoint a Cabinet to help him develop policies together with the parliament and help administer the State. Also, you may want to appoint an Upper House to help with constitutional, technical and other problems. The racial politics is very intense in Guyana. The above proposal (in my opinion) is guaranteed to help reduce the intensity of racial politics by 50%. The other 50% will be dealt with by racial parity laws of the State.
Yours faithfully,
Mike Persaud