The contretemps over how Ms Manickchand comported herself at the farewell reception for the former American Ambassador has had a longer afterlife than the government no doubt expected. It has also generated far more criticism than the government no doubt expected either. That the administration was caught off guard by the public reaction is suggested by some of the odd statements it has issued in response to the widespread disapproval, those emanating from Presidential Advisor Gail Teixeira in particular being quite bizarre. She was reported as saying that the condemnation of Minister Manickchand for her behaviour was motivated by both sexism and racism. One can only wonder whether Ms Teixeira seriously believes that had Mr Robeson Benn, for example, been sent forth by the mandarins in the Cabinet Room to deliver the famous salvo, the resulting criticism would have been any more muted. If she does, then she is living in a different planetary zone from the rest of the Guyanese population.
Courtesy of a letter to the press from Professor Duke Pollard and a column in this newspaper by Dr Henry Jeffrey, the government and Freedom House have now latched on to the Vienna Convention, among other documents, as the basis for a full-blown attack on former Ambassador Hardt. It might be noted for the sake of argument, that even if it were the case that Mr Hardt was in breach of these, it still would not justify Ms Manickchand’s extraordinary behaviour at the reception in question. She was in breach of a whole range of conventions, some of them quite commonplace.
As for the Vienna Convention, it came into operation at the height of the Cold War in the early 1960s, in an era when democracy was hardly the watchword it is today. Even so, apart from more minor instances, there were extreme cases of direct interference by one state in the internal affairs of another, such as in Pol Pot’s Cambodia and Idi Amin’s Uganda – to the relief of most countries, it might be added. There was also the case of Cuban forces’ involvement in Angola’s civil war, that was condemned by the United States, although for obvious reasons not by the Eastern bloc or by the PPP at the time.
Nowadays hemispheric and international organisations of one kind or another have adopted democracy and the rule of law as one of their principles, and that includes the OAS and the Commonwealth. The OAS, for example, has had the situation in Venezuela on its agenda for some time, and has sent a team of foreign ministers there and calling for democracy is hardly viewed as a breach of the Vienna Convention, whatever the context. And as many people have pointed out, the PPP didn’t think the US was in breach of it either at the end of the period when the PNC was in power.
And let us not forget what we are talking about: It is the need for local government elections, and the administration’s feeble rationalizations for not holding them. The Ambassador did not even do what President Obama did, who recently suggested to the Scots how they should vote in their September 18 independence referendum. That produced barely a ripple north of the River Tweed; even Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond confined himself to observing in so many words that it was counter-productive for American politicians to speak publicly on the subject.
In an attempt to suppress feelings of guilt about the local government elections, Freedom House and various government ministers have turned not just to denigrating Ambassador Hardt and anyone who has spoken in his favour, but to holding up Ms Manickchand as a paragon of patriotism. In this weekend’s Mirror, for example, the Women’s Progressive Organization moved from “Who does he think he is…?” in relation to the former, to “Courageous and patriotic is the woman who stood up for her country,” in respect of the latter. Exactly when impropriety and bad manners became equated with patriotism was never explained.
Of course, prior to this ‘anti-patriotic’ had become the new buzz word of the PPP, and was tossed in the face of every politician or commentator who criticized the government at any level. We had already reached the point, therefore, that everyone opposing the government was by definition anti-patriotic (or anti-nationalist), the converse being, presumably, that members of Freedom House and its supporters were the only ones who could be patriotic. It should hardly be surprising, therefore, that Ms Manickchand has now achieved the status of a super patriot.
This use of extreme and inappropriate language – of which opposition elements are also guilty, it must be said – and the never-ending misjudgements as in the case of the tirade at the Ambassador’s residence, signify an administration in trouble. It happens to all governments which have been in power for a very long time. In the case of this one, it has lost its connection to its roots; it has lost its connection to its traditional constituency; and it has lost its sense of direction. Most of all, it has ceased to listen to anyone outside its party’s hallowed walls, and hears only what it wants to hear. As a consequence, it has lost touch with reality and cannot, therefore make any rational, objective assessment of a situation.
Clinging desperately to its traditional modus operandi in the hope that that might yet work, it has no idea how it should go about changing its situation, let alone the game. So it resorts to becoming shriller and shriller, and sees monsters in every corner, whether these are ambassadors, as in this case, leaders of opposition parties, the independent press or certain commentators. Not one of them is the government’s real problem.
If the government wants to deal with its real problems, it will have to reconcile itself to local government elections, no matter what it fears in relation to the result, and it will have to be prepared to negotiate with the opposition. Railing at ambassadors and dreaming up extravagant defences of ministers in the current circumstances are little better than diversions.
Freedom House has now reached the outer limit of pretending that the PPP/C is in the majority; even it must be forced to face up to this in some way now that the Sword of Damocles in the form of a no-confidence vote hangs over its head. And as said already, its way out is not far to seek, and it does not include citing the Vienna Convention or praising Ms Manickchand’s super patriotism. In the situation in which it finds itself, quite simply, it needs to have recourse to rather more democracy.
