Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport Charles Ramson says the Opposition APNU+AFC should have been invited to the Republic Day flag-raising ceremony but said that he did not “follow through” with the planning of the event.
The ceremony was held on the lawns outside of Parliament on February 22 and saw the attendance of foreign diplomats and a slew of government officials. The only Opposition Parliamentarian present was the Liberty and Justice Party’s Lenox Shuman – who said he received an invite, twice, from the Ministry and Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport.
“The invitation was sent to my office but because of the oil and gas conference, I did not go into the office. So I did not see the invitation but I asked the Minister (of Culture, Youth and Sport) if I could attend without the invite and he sent me an electronic copy and I attended,” he had told Stabroek News.
The APNU+AFC was not invited to the event and government had remained silent on the matter. Stabroek News had reached out to President Irfaan Ali’s press unit for a comment on the exclusion of the Opposition but is yet to receive a response, months later.
On Wednesday, as he was making his way out of the National Assembly, Stabroek News spoke to Minister Ramson who had not been taking calls from this newspaper on the matter. He denied deliberately excluding the Opposition from the event while adding that it is an issue that he wishes not to address publicly.
“I don’t think it was an exclusion. I read about it [the exclusion of the Opposition] just like you. The office is responsible for distributing the invitations and I never followed through with it and it obviously saw that it was published and I told my staff that that shouldn’t be the case,” he said.
The Minister admitted that the responsibility to organize national events falls within his remit adding that the Opposition should have been invited. However, he reiterated that it is an issue that he wishes not to address publicly.
When asked, since he restated his wish not to address the issue publicly, if he had reached out to the Opposition, Ramson said “I don’t speak to the Opposition in any shape or form, nothing. I don’t have any engagement with the Opposition. For people that have done what they have done and never expressed contrition [I cannot engage].”
Ramson added “I saw the story and I don’t expect that to reoccur for the national events [but] not all the events because it’s not my MO (modus operandi) where all types of events, where it will be expected of me or expected of the state where we invite the Opposition. For national events, we will seek to have them included.”
Opposition Chief Whip Christopher Jones had told Stabroek News that they received no invitation from the government or the organisers of the event. He said that they were flabbergasted at the move and some MPs even visited Parliament office to see if the invites were dropped off there.
Since taking office, President Ali has been constantly playing up a “One Guyana” narrative, speaking of inclusion and collaboration across all forms. In his address at the flag-raising ceremony, President Ali spoke of building a “One Guyana” where there is no room for division. However, the exclusion of the APNU+AFC Parliamentary Opposition, which represents over 200,000 eligible Guyanese voters, runs counter to that narrative.
While in Opposition, the PPP/C chose to stay away from national flag-raising events after it attended the Golden Jubilee flag-raising ceremony in 2016 and the then APNU+AFC administration reportedly failed to provide them with adequate seating.
Previously, when asked whether the APNU+AFC Opposition would have shown up to the flag-raising ceremony, Jones said that MPs were prepared to show up even without being invited.
“Within our MP WhatsApp group…some MPs (were) saying I am going. MPs were prepared to dress and show up. As a representative of the people, there is an expectation that you would be invited to these forums and you have to attend. It is not PNC or PPP this, this is national…if the invitations were available there were 14 MPs that would have been present excluding those that live out of Georgetown,” he had said.
Guyana became a Republic in 1970 under the PNC government of Forbes Burnham.
With Guyana poised to celebrate its 56th Independence Anniversary of May 26, all eyes are on the government and the APNU+AFC to see if there will be a repeat of the Republic Day events.
