Dear Editor,
In a letter to the Stabroek News of March 5th on the question of voting and other rights of the Guyanese diaspora, Vishnu Bisram refers to the struggle for the restoration of democracy, and mentions the limiting of rights under what he calls the ‘Burnham constitution.’
While it is certainly an undeniable fact that the 1980 constitution was imposed upon the Guyanese people through a fraudulent referendum during the Burnham years, it strikes me as ridiculous to simply speak of the ‘Burnham constitution’ without qualification, and after 18 unbroken years of a PPP/C administration during which the most egregious aspects of this document still hang around the necks of the Guyanese citizens. For example, it is long past the time when we should be asking, why has the PPP never demonstrated any unhappiness with the powers of the Executive Presidency as enshrined under the 1980 constitution, and is not among the forces calling for its dismantling? Why is it that when the matter of the Executive Presidency was raised— in the course of the deliberations of the Constitutional Reform Commission (CRC) in 1999 – neither the PPP nor the PNC supported the arguments for its abolition? One can only assume, since they have both had a taste of it, that the concentration of power seems to suit them both fine.
It is therefore disingenuous to refer only to a Burnham Constitution today. It is an easily used smokescreen that hides the fact that the PPP administration has had close to two decades to make changes. Two decades. Enough time for a whole generation of voters to come of age this year and head to the polls, so let us be clear about who is standing in the way of change. Notwithstanding the efforts of the CRC to trim some of the more grotesque powers of the Executive Presidency, such as the immunities, and to shift the centre of gravity of governmental authority towards the parliament and independent constitutional commissions, the concentration of authority is in fact greater than ever after the years of the PPP. This is more than a mere changing of the guard, this is a further entrenchment of the guard’s position. Are we to believe that this was what those who struggled for the restoration of democracy fought for?
We should ask, where do all of the parties and their ‘presidential’ contenders stand with regard to the Executive Presidency in this an election year?
Yours faithfully,
Alissa Trotz
