The significance of the recently concluded local government elections is unlikely to become fully apparent for some time yet, even though the fact that after more than two decades we have, at last, been able to pull off a local government poll is in itself an accomplishment. It happened against the backdrop of our own recognition that what had been in place up until now had become moribund and was no longer serving a purpose beyond consuming resources, occupying bureaucratic space and for the most part serving as a frustrating reminder of how not to get things done. Perhaps more importantly, we could no longer, after more than two decades with a local government poll, pretend, however remotely, that we were enjoying a condition of democracy at the community level.
In mature democracies it is the council, rather than central government, that provides both critical resources and oversight at the community level. Councils commonly play a role in health provision and equally importantly in the provision of local sanitation and environmental services (arguably the primary failing of the previous local government administration in Guyana), the quality of our local neighbourhoods being essential to the quality of our lives. Other community issues like planning and road and water management, issues which are life-changing, as much for residents as for businesses are commonly the responsibility of local government authorities in many countries. That is why, in Britain, for example – and almost certainly elsewhere in Europe – the electorate is inclined to rate local government as a far more important driver of democratic participation than the European Union. The fact is that in Britain councils exert considerable control over a number of local public services. As the London School of Economics Professor Tony Travers put it in a May 20, 2014 Guardian article, “as the state becomes more fragmented the role of councils could, potentially, become even more important.”
Leaving aside the issue of the fragmentation of the state we must wait and see whether local government elections will not only be a precursor to genuine local democracy but whether they will result in meaningful transformation at the community level across the country. That will, of course, depend on whether these recently concluded elections now mean that local democracy will be allowed to grow and flourish. If we are to be honest with ourselves – and it would be foolhardy to do otherwise at this stage of our development – local democracy has existed largely in the stranglehold of central government, allowed only so much elbow room in a society where central government has insisted – utilizing political muscle and the power of the purse strings ‒ on riding roughshod over power at every level of the society. That, indeed, has been the single biggest failing of our local government. Frankly, whether what has been in place over the years qualifies as an exercise in genuine democracy is certainly questionable if for no other reason than the near complete absence of genuine community participation.
How much will change now that the polls are done and dusted is hard to say; after all, both the politicking that preceded the poll and the actual voting patterns sent a strong signal that political choices continue to be dictated by those loyalties that have long existed at the level of mainstream politics. Indeed, there even appeared to be instances of intra-party differences arising out of the emergence of splinter groups that may have wanted to go their own way at least for the purpose of managing their own communities, the BIGA group in Bartica being one such example. More than that it is noteworthy that the most the People’s Progressive Party could find to say about the outcome of the local government poll were words to the effect that what the people really wanted was a change in central government. It does not appear that they could find any significance in the poll in its own right.
There is, of course, an important lesson to be learnt there and that has to do with the fact that our political culture still remains largely unchanged and that when it comes to electoral choices, whether those be at the national or local level, attitudes are still deeply ingrained and that it will take a great deal more than the articulation of a ‘policy’ of social cohesion to change things around. That is probably one of the most important lessons (reminders may be a more appropriate term) that the local government elections have taught us.
Apart from its role in publicly demonstrating the virtue of democratic behaviour, there may, arguably, be more on the positive side that local government elections have realized. Far more worthwhile than the largely lacklustre campaigning of the major political parties were the energetic efforts of the political newcomers, numbered amongst whom were young people who were throwing their hats into the political ring for the first time. Aside from the opening allowed by the local government for their possible entry into mainstream politics, there has simply been no other way save and except through the vehicle of the country’s two main political forces, a situation that remains true, the more recent emergence of the Alliance for Change notwithstanding. What the local government elections have (hopefully) done is to shine a spotlight on some of our emerging leaders so that, over time, their performances at the local level might at least be used as barometers of their likely potential as mainstream national leaders.
Partisan politics aside (and we in Guyana tend to delude ourselves about this) our politicians at the national level function in a manner that is indicative of a disregard for local government. It is this altogether irrational belief that central government always knows best and more importantly that it is large and in charge that has engendered an acceptance at the centre the Councils can be treated as lesser political beings. Evidence of this is perhaps to be found in what many felt was the lukewarm political campaign that preceded the local government elections.
Ironically, polls in other countries have pointed to a far higher level of trust amongst the electorate in councillors than in ministers of government since the former are not only more accessible but also less likely to be caught up in their ministerial agendas which, all too often, have no direct bearing on the immediate needs of small communities.
What local government elections also do is create competitive pressure for enhanced community services in a manner that makes local politics no less important than the goings on at the level of central government; and there are many more worthwhile objectives that we can target in the wake of this month’s local government elections.
