The governing party is certainly not insensitive to the fact that its ability to win elections depends on the Indigenous vote. The demographics of the nation have changed, and for many years now the PPP/C has been in no doubt that the Indian constituency on its own cannot sweep it into office. If there had been unity among the various nations and they had had their own party, they could have held the balance in Parliament so neither of the political heavyweights would have held an overall majority. Unity, however, is not something which has been seen since Stephen Campbell’s day in the 1960s, and currently the Indigenous vote is split.
The approach of Freedom House to the situation in Indigenous areas has been a mixture of control coupled with persuasion in the form of tractors, trailers, outboard engines and the like, recalling the ‘presents’ of an earlier colonial era. For much of the period since independence most Indigenous people were isolated from coastal political machinations, and generally looked for governments to provide material assistance in one form or another, that was indeed often forthcoming around election time. But the situation is not quite so simple nowadays.
For one thing there has been greater penetration of the hinterland by coastal interests than was ever the case before, in addition to which the interior population has been far more directly in contact with the coast than ever before, and is more attuned to the complexities of national politics.
Then there is the matter of the 2006 Amerindian Act, which entrenched the system of village government which first found expression in legislation of the 1950s, but more important also established a National Toshaos Council. This body allowed Indigenous representatives from all over the nation to come together to discuss matters which affected them, in addition to which it provided an official forum for them to tell the government what their views were.
It was in effect the first structured democratic vehicle for Indigenous people, who owing to their dispersal around the hinterland had not been able to express themselves as a combined group in this way before. Even after it was set up there were still questions about what its precise rules and procedures should be, although by 2017, its understanding of the proprieties of government was apparent. Various PPP/C governments were never really concerned about Indigenous democracy; what they wanted to ensure was that the villages voted for them. As such, their attitude to the NTC was that it should be controlled.
While the coalition government allowed the Council far greater room for manoeuvre than did the PPP/C, it also came in for serious criticism in other respects. However, the 2017 NTC statement spelt out the issues with Freedom House: “Let us first identify that it is only under this administration [the coalition government],” it said, “that the NTC has been given a ‘small’ room to grow. Under the PPP, every single component from the Chairman’s remarks, to who spoke, and when to hush leaders were all managed by the PPP. Independent media and other organizations were also banned from attending and the agenda and everything else was managed by the PPP.”
In 2020 there was no Toshaos Council meeting because of the Covid situation, and a DPI release said that a team headed by the Minister of Amerindian Affairs Pauline Sukhai would visit the various regions and meet the village leaders there instead. This was hardly a substitute for a democratic encounter, but was understandable given the pandemic situation. That situation did not improve in 2021, nevertheless, the elections for Toshaos at the village level still took place earlier in the year. What the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs decided as an alternative to the Toshaos conference was to hold regional meetings. Minister Sukhai explained that out of caution, the government would not be able to gather 220 leaders together in the city or in any one location, but that at the regional level with the smaller numbers they could manage social distancing.
The Minister indicated that leaders could discuss concerns and priorities for the budget, and they would be able to have an engagement with ministers “so there will be active discussion going on with and among leaders and their sector ministries.” More important, she said, a platform would be provided so that executive members of the NTC could be elected by these regional representatives.
The regional meetings did not find universal acceptance, and the Upper Mazaruni District Council, for one, expressed concern that they contravened the NTC rules of procedure, an observation also made more comprehensively by Mr Mervyn Williams in a letter to this newspaper. The District Council proposed that whatever interim executive body was elected should be considered for ratification, or that elections for an official executive body be held at the Council in 2022. NTCs usually meet around July and executives sit for three years; Chairmen and Vice Chairmen are elected at the first meeting.
According to Mr Williams’s letter, the regional meeting at Lethem was not a resounding success, and it was alleged that the “political heavy hand had prevailed in the election of three Regional representatives.” Whatever exactly transpired, the regional exercise fizzled out thereafter, and there is still no NTC executive in place through which the Indigenous people as a whole can address the government. Mr Williams’ solution was to extend the life of the last NTC executive, as has been done in the case of other local democratic organs in the absence of local government elections.
Mr Williams also asked rhetorically about a strategy for reducing poverty, or whether the government was prepared to listen to Indigenous leaders regarding what they preferred for their villages, among other things. “In the absence of an executive, the NTC cannot ‘advise’ the Minister on the … need for changes in both policy and legislation,” he said.
PPP/C MP Alister Charlie wasted no time in responding, maintaining that the “advancement of Amerindians and their development at a national level” was not on hold because there was no NTC executive. “The reality is that the development of the 220 Amerindian villages and communities in Guyana is on an upward spiral since August of 2020…,” he wrote, going on to itemise the government’s development successes since coming to office.
The issue is not about economic development; it is about local democracy as it applies to the Indigenous peoples. They are not part of the general local government arrangements; they are specially catered for, and bypassing their structures is no more justified than bypassing the laws for the various tiers of local government as they apply to everyone else. Perhaps the administration might consider extending the life of the last NTC, as has been suggested. It cannot resist indefinitely the hunger for local democracy among the Indigenous peoples.
