Dear Editor,
Region 10 is concerned at the unfolding of events in our sister Region 4 City Council and the silence of many significant voices in society. The events unfolding at the Georgetown City Council are sending an ominous message for the respect for law and order and the will of the people. The only way the government can get away with this is in a society that lacks knowledge of good governance, their rights and what constitutes good governance. This is why the LEAD Project is so important, that with empowerment people will resist this kind of violation and eye-pass. The government has no regard for the opposition and the people.
In these modern times a government that can disrespect the will of the people, the Constitution, is a government that is prepared to rule by edict. This here that has gone unchallenged in the society is also testimony to the complacency and complicity that are taking place between the government and certain leading powers. This would have never been acceptable under the government of Forbes Burnham, Desmond Hoyte, or any PNC government.
Region 10 calls on the people of Guyana to wake up and recognise before it is too late that the violations taking place in the City Council of Georgetown is a threat to the stability of our society, peace and good health of the citizens of our capital city.
There should be no partisan politics when we are all saddled in the same boat and treated with the same disdain and disrespect.
After 19 years of failing to hold local government elections and ensuring that democracy is upheld in the Cooperative Republic of Guyana and in Region 4 through local government elections, this government that resisted the LEAD Project sponsored by the U.S. government at no cost to the taxpayers of Guyana has the audacity to be imposing on the local democratic organs Interim Management Committees like what was done in Linden and Kwakwani. This is clear dictatorship when the will of the people, the masses in society no longer matter and a few illegitimately determine who is entitled to receive and who is denied fundamental right to elect their own leaders. However the will is with the people, as was demonstrated on the 6th September 2012 in Kwakwani, where over four hundred residents elected their own representatives and still do recognize those who they would have voted for. That was over 60% of the voting population.
No government in any part of the world would be considered democratic who has failed to hold constitutionally due elections for over 19 years.
The PPP supporters are called on to join hands acknowledging your Guyanese citizenship first and foremost before political allegiance. Let us put our hearts and hands together and put Guyana first and tell the politicians wreaking havoc in our country, no more. No more.
The people of Region 10 are concerned and we are saying to the government that Region 10 will not accept further disrespect by his government. Region 10 is not prepared to have anyone disrespect its right to choice of leadership. Region 10 is calling for local government elections long overdue. For failing to uphold the Constitution that speaks to the regularity of this process constitutes rigging by any means necessary to dominate and undermine democratic processes.
Under the PPP government Guyanese continue to migrate in droves to any foreign land that will take them. The recent long line at the US Embassy’s event bears testimony to this fact, the desperation that our people of all races and walks of life feel. We call on them to take example from the people whose countries they now flee to, for they would have stood up and fought for the rights and privileges they now enjoy that Guyanese are migrating to enjoy in another man’s country. We are encouraging citizens to fight for their civil rights at home. It is right and just to do so.
Yours faithfully,
Sharma Solomon
Regional Chairman
Region 10
