The Alliance for Change (AFC) yesterday rejected the statement by President Donald Ramotar that the opposition’s rejection of a bill and motion dealing with the Amaila Falls Hydroelectricity Project is an “act of terrorism against the development of Guyana.”
“It is a dangerous statement and a threat to all law-abiding citizens. It is grounded in shallow political rhetoric that is designed to terrorise the national elected Parliamentarians into submission. President Ramotar after all has suggested that the 33 elected opposition MPs are domestic terrorists and we call for condemnation of this,” the AFC said in a statement yesterday.
The party asserted that Ramotar’s statements are “unjust and unfair and contain some dangerous characterization which compromises the independence of the Legislative Branch of the Government and we call for the immediate withdrawal of this intemperate comment.” It added that the AFC hopes that in the future, greater emphasis can be placed on developing greater levels of negotiation and compromise in the interest of all Guyana.
On Thursday, the opposition voted against the Hydro Electric Power (Amendment) Bill, a piece of legislation aimed at making the Amaila Falls Hydro project compliant in terms of sustainable development and the environmental policies of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) which is one of the prospective high-profile financiers of the project. They also blocked the passage of the motion whose resolve clause would have seen the increase of the limit for loan guarantees, a requirement to allow the Guyana Power and Light to have a Power Purchase Agreement with the Amaila Falls Hydro project.
In a televised address on Friday evening, Ramotar said it was a sad day for Guyanese but government will press ahead in seeking to provide cheap and reliable energy. “We will not be swayed by narrow-minded political agendas looking to stymie our development thrust,” said Ramotar. Speaking of the opposition, Ramotar said: “Their actions now place the Amaila Falls Hydro-electric project, the largest project in Guyana’s history, in jeopardy.”
Yesterday, the AFC said that parliamentarians are elected to enable and give life to the constitution and thus are protected by the rule of law in doing their work on the people’s behalf. “At no time are parliamentarians engaged in acts of terrorism in the chambers of the National Assembly,” the AFC said while calling on Ramotar to “respect and embrace the founding principles of our God given, unalienable fundamental rights to Life, Liberty and most importantly the freedom of expression” rather than to use the Office of the President “to trash these core values of the Guyanese people with his wild claim that the opposition defeat of the Amaila issues as an “act of terrorism” against development in Guyana.”
According to the AFC, the President’s comments do not respect the will of the Guyanese people. The statement said that the AFC must remain prudent before supporting any public policy of the PPP/C government, “especially since they have accumulated a reputation for [manufacturing] information, scandals and unfair practices as they continue to mislead the nation.”
The statement said that the AFC continues to make it absolutely clear that it has a duty to the Guyanese people to ensure accountability for the public purse and to ensure that the public debt dynamics remain sustainable. “We in the AFC have stated publically that we want a professional opinion from the IDB before we sign on to any increase in the debt ceiling and feel justified in taking this stance,” the statement said.
It added that the AFC is not interested in another Skeldon Sugar Factory and thus has a duty to the children of Guyana, who in time will be saddled with the responsibility of paying back any future debt. Therefore, the AFC will only support projects that will maximize their contribution to economic growth and poverty reduction, the statement said.
“We in the AFC intend to monitor closely the risks related to the contingent liability exposure associated with the Amaila Hydro Project to not compromise the medium-term debt management strategy. We recognize that only the IDB has the capacity to investigate and signal financial approval and we prefer to wait on this before moving forward on these issues,” it added.
The AFC said it is committed to motivating the PPP/C government to taking Guyana towards a reduction in the primary fiscal deficit, as one of the many measures to help contain the public debt-to-GDP ratio towards a level of 60 per cent or below. “We in the AFC are not ready to go back to the un-creditworthy days of the PNC ever again and thus this runaway appetite of the PPP for new debt has to be interrogated and questioned. That is why we ask the PPP/C government to act more responsibly and await the due diligence report from the IDB and if the report is favourable from our perspective, we are prepared to support all the rational conditionalities associated with the Amaila Hydro project,” the party said.
