-trumpets achievements
The PPP on Saturday trumpeted its performance in government hailing its achievements in the economy, social services and infrastructure sectors but refused to publicly discuss any possible reform as called for by former party stalwart, Ralph Ramkarran who has said that urgent change is needed if the party is to gain a majority at the polls.
“Ramkarran‘s views on the Party’s rule would not be discussed here. That will be done internally. We have mechanisms to do so. They have not changed, at least not yet,” said a statement, issued via PPP Executive Secretary, Zulficar Mustapha.
Ramkarran, a former longstanding PPP executive who parted ways with the party in June following fallout from an explosive column he penned in which he said that corruption was pervasive and the government needed to do something about it, wrote in an article published in last week’s Sunday Stabroek that urgent reforms are needed if the PPP is to retain enough support to ensure a majority at the polls.
“With a dwindling electoral base, a permanent majority might no longer be assured in the future, unless urgent reforms are put in place to restore the support the Party had in 2006 and to attract wider support,” he wrote. “Unless measures are taken, not tomorrow, but today, the stark reality of a future of coalition governments must be now placed on the table for consideration, however reluctant it may be to do so,” he said.
Among other things, he had said that all important decisions, including potentially the choice of party leader and the presidential candidate, must be made by a vote of members. “Office holders must be named in the constitution and must be elected at the congress. The Central Committee and the Executive Committee must be elected at congress. New rules, in relation to the whole gamut of issues, will modernize the Party for the new challenges which it faces and at the same time institutionalize practices which have already been adopted,” he had said.
Racial/ethnic stance
In the statement on Saturday, the PPP said that it rejected racial appeal from its inception and expressed surprise that “at the heart” of Ramkarran’s analysis was “a racial/ethnic stance” and charged that he also resorted to ethnic counting, “something he knows is only discussed when we are responding to the opposition line or when the opposition tries to exploit race for their narrow political ends. The PPP and PPP/C work for every Guyanese vote, regardless of ethnic origins and it has been loyal to that position at all times”, the statement said.
It noted that at the last election the PPP/C, while it lost Indian votes, managed to win almost 50% of the votes cast. “This shows that our line in working to win over all sections of our population is the only correct one,” the statement said.
The party also said that there is enough evidence to show that it lost votes as a consequence of some administrative measures within the electoral machinery in some areas and this is why the two opposition parties did not want a recount of the votes.
Consulting
The PPP also denied that it was not consulting with the opposition and said that with regards to the 2012 Budget the government, at the highest level of leadership, met with the opposition. “Those meetings reached important agreements, and demonstrated the PPP/C’s clear willingness to negotiate in good faith, to be flexible and open to compromise in the national interest, unlike the opposition,” the statement said. It cited the increase in the old age pension and added that it was the opposition that reneged on the agreements reached on the electricity tariffs at Linden.
The party said that it had called for budget consultations but “what was rejected was the demand to set up a joint body to write the budget. To have accepted that would have meant that the PPP/C administration was abdicating the responsibility given to it by the Constitution derived from the mandate of the people.”
The party also said that it is “only highlighting the reality that presently exists” when it attacks the opposition.
The party cited several examples and asked “are they not together violating the Parliament and trying to destroy a stalwart of the PPP and patriot of Guyana, Clement Rohee? No one should expect us to do nothing in light of the vicious onslaught.” According to the statement, all the positions that the party has taken could be supported by the situation on the ground created by the opposition.
The PPP said that Ramkarran is right that conditions at the time the party took office have changed radically from what they were in the 1970s and much had to be changed to take those new developments into account and the party is still pursuing policies to promote the working people in the new conditions. “He has ignored that the total thrust of the government is aimed at consolidating democracy and expanding benefits to working people,” it asserted.
The PPP acknowledged that Ramkarran worked on many of their basic documents.
The statement said that the party always wanted a good working relationship with the private sector and questioned rhetorically whether it wasn’t Cheddi Jagan‘s government in the 1960s that built the local private sector and developed the industrial estates both in the 1960s and after he returned to government in 1992.
Corruption
The party also acknowledged that there is corruption. “Ramkarran is right, we have corruption in our country and we have to fight against it, we have to get rid of it, root and branch,” the PPP asserted while adding that the former Speaker of the National Assembly has not recognized the measures that the government has taken to fight the scourge.
The statement said that it was the PPP/C that reintroduced the preparation and tabling of audited public accounts in the National Assembly after the PNC had discontinued this practice for over a decade and it also ensured that amendments to the Constitution to strengthen the independence of the Audit Office, among other actions such as the enactment of modern financial management legislation. The statement added that it was the PPP/C that introduced competitive public tendering for government procurement, and removed the political directorate from the contract award process by reposing in the cabinet just the right to grant its no objection.
In terms of the economy, the statement said that Ramkarran dismisses the achievement of stable macroeconomic fundamentals as unimportant but it asserted that the achievement of those very stable and strong macroeconomic fundamentals has been a signal achievement of the PPP/C in government. It said that due to its policies, Guyana is attractive to international business investment, which has led to creation of jobs and generation of incomes for thousands of Guyanese families.
The statement also noted that Ramkarran dismissed Guyana’s real GDP growth performance as inadequate but the party said that over the past six years, despite the global economy being in the worst crisis in living memory, the Guyanese economy has recorded six years of uninterrupted positive growth at an average of 4.5 per cent. “Importantly, the sources of Guyana’s economic growth are more diversified today than ever before, and we are less dependent on and vulnerable to the traditional sectors than we ever were, although these sectors remain important,” the party said.
The statement also declared that tremendous progress has been made in improving every key indicator relating to access to social services and social sector outcomes while it hailed the “phenomenal accomplishments” of successive PPP/C administrations in restoring the collapsed physical infrastructure of Guyana. “…the physical infrastructure of our country has been totally transformed and is currently being further expanded and modernized,” the party said.
“As a result of these fundamental omissions, Ramkarran’s analysis of the performance of the PPP/C administration as it relates to management of the Guyanese economy is fundamentally flawed and incomplete,” the party declared.
It added that Ramkarran is wrong when he said that “…the only factor which appears to be keeping the government in office is the lack of enthusiasm of all parties for new elections …”
“The fact is that the government is kept in office because of the support of the people for the administration,” it said while adding they the opposition was opposed to a recount of the votes and may very well be afraid of losing their one seat majority at new elections.
In terms of shared governance, the party said that it has never opposed this. “We have said clearly that for it to be successful we have to build trust. Otherwise it could be a failure.
Everything that has happened since the elections of 2011 has vindicated that position,” it said.
