Dear Editor,
I welcome the introduction of another polling body (Barbados-based Caribbean Development Research Services Inc or CADRES) to Guyana’s politics, because I had truly become fed up, to the point of distrustful, of anything Mr Vishnu Bisram’s NACTA surveys and polls revealed about Guyana.
That said, I would like to know who privately commissioned the polling of 1000 Guyanese representing the ten administrative regions and the methodology, because if the situation in Guyana remains largely unchanged then those numbers are truly refreshing and bode well for political change in 2011. On the other hand, I really don’t want polls that are tailored to suit any political party or which give Guyanese a sense of false hope. We have already had almost 46 years of hopelessness.
Now, I know that Stabroek News reserves the right to give letters and news stories its own caption, but how can your newspapers look at the numbers released by CADRES and give a caption that reads, ‘PPP/C holds biggest bloc of voters – CADRS poll’? Traditionally, the PPP has had a lock on the biggest bloc of voters because it enjoyed a numerical majority among Indians, so a headline that says it holds the biggest bloc of voters does not come as a surprise.
The biggest element of surprise in the news story is the fact that the Alliance For Change, which has been around only four years, has managed to gain the trust and support of 26% of those polled, compared to the PPP with 38% and the PNC with 31%. The headline should then read, ‘AFC gains big on the PPP, PNC; could help form next government – CADRES poll,’ because “when asked directly which party they would support if an election were held at the time of the survey, the PPP/Civic got support from 25% of respondents, the AFC 25% and the PNCR 23%, while other parties drew a total 3%, and persons in the “Don’t know/Won’t say” category accounted for 24%.”
I am not saying the AFC will get 25% or 26% of the votes in 2011, because anything could happen between now and then, but these figures reveal how people are thinking based on the current situation in Guyana, and despite the government’s spinners attempting to portray progress under President Bharrat Jagdeo, the reality on the ground says differently. In addition, even though “the data does demonstrate that the PPP/Civic still commands the largest bloc of voters and would have first option to form a government if an election were held,” the same data demonstrates a post-election coalition, akin to 1964, could also unseat the PPP even if it gains more votes than the other contending parties, but not enough to form the government on its own.
But what I also find especially reassuring is the fact that though the PNCR’s support base is still largely African-Guyanese, while the PPP/Civic’s is still predominantly Indian-Guyanese, the AFC’s tends to be younger and mixed, albeit more inclined towards African-Guyanese. When it was first launched, the AFC held itself out as the political alternative to the PPP and PNC, and noted particularly the need to de-emphasize the role of ethnicity in gaining support and votes.
By all accounts, when the AFC gained six parliamentary seats, it did so with the votes of mostly Blacks who defected from the PNC, but that was not surprising given that Blacks had grown frustrated with the PNC and looked for the first opportunity to expresses that frustration. A significant number of Indians, meanwhile, who were clearly frustrated with the PPP by 2006, chose to stay away from the polling booth rather than vote for either the PPP or even the AFC, but that ‘boycott’ sent a powerful message to the PPP that it was losing support among its traditional base. If that frustration level remains or rises before the 2011 election, the PPP could be looking at a political coffin of its own making.
With a considerable number of voters who were born after 1966 not being aware of the actual bad blood between the PPP and PNC, but being aware of the stagnation of the country because of the PPP-PNC politics, it is possible that the younger voters who appear to support the AFC, could make a major difference in 2011. This is a demographic President Jagdeo should have cornered because when he became President in 1999, he was 35 years old and appealed to many youths; unfortunately, he has since gone on to preside over the most corrupt and inept government in the Caribbean with a lot of unresolved issues. Trinidad may well be an example of what happens when people are fed up and really want change; they go for it even if it means a coalition of parties and groups not stained by corrupt politics.
Today, young people want jobs, and for those getting ready to graduate from university or leave school altogether, the goal is not to look for work in Guyana and build a home and life, but to raise enough money to flee the country. The future for the younger voters is bleak and unless there is a new government with a new vision, Guyana’s chief export will be its people.
Yours faithfully,
Emile Mervin
