Leaders need to place greater attention on how to deliver better governance after elections

Dear Editor,

As a keen observer of Guyana’s politics, governance, development processes; I would like to make the following observations on a few specific areas to which our political leadership/parties – both the old parties and new ones need to pay closer attention.

Much of the political analysis relative to the upcoming elections focuses more on the ‘who’. Who are the players, who should be players, who should form alliances, who can win and who cannot win, who should be Prime Minister and who should be President, whether the smaller parties should come together or contest separately; while this discourse is important, I think that it is too narrow. There needs to be more discussions and debates on not merely the who or even on good governance; but on better governance. Here I would like to focus on the value of having leaders who understand ‘organization’ and ‘institution’, or at least listen to people who do.

One of the APNU+AFC Administration’s biggest challenges in my view, was not bringing enough people on board who understand organization and institutions. Meaning, how they are established, how they function, the interconnectedness of the various parts, how the various players should work together, the process, etc.

What is interesting, is that this was the same challenge the PPP/C administration had; however, by the time the PPP/C really started to understand governance in the context of organization and institution, there were issues of corruption.

Hence, the elections discourse must also include; not only the ‘who’ will win and what they must do to win, but also the ‘how’. How will these parties govern differently, if given the opportunity?

One of my reservations with the smaller parties; is that not many of the players understand governance – organization and institution either. The level of experience and exposure from managing one’s own business, even a medium size business; is no comparison to the complexities of leading, governing and managing a country.

Also, while some of the members of these new parties were involved in governments previously, they have been a part of those very systems of poor governance, so what needs to come out more as they campaign, is how are they going to govern differently?

Back to the APNU+AFC Coalition. The APNU+AFC tapped into that collective strength while campaigning for the 2015 elections but have not really harnessed that collective power. However, since nothing just happens, internal cohesion in the APNU+AFC Coalition will take effort; it will require compromises and more compromises; it will require people to be practical; people will need to like each other or at least like what they can achieve together. Critical to achieving this internal cohesion is that the individual parties need to work harder on building cohesion within their parties.

There are recommendations that the smaller parties should come together. My questions are: What are the commonalities for them coming together? What are the values of the individual parties? What are the principles of the individual parties? What are the various leadership styles? What are the various philosophies upon which they were created? What are their motivations? Now these parties have just formed their organisations and are still adjusting to this new construct; some of them do not even have proper form, systems, structures or processes yet, what exactly are they bringing to add to the whole? What is their added value as individual parties? Do they know what is their added value? I am just asking the hard questions. It is not just about coming together, but exactly what components, elements are the smaller individual parties bringing to form a political/governance alliance or a partnership?

What the APNU+AFC discovered was that signing an agreement before the elections and working together - or rather governing together after, are totally different things. As the saying in Guyana goes ‘come see me and come live with me, are two different things.’ The common goal between the APNU+AFC in 2015 was to beat the PPP/C at the elections, that goal was so strong that, it kept the alliance together; however, after the elections, they had to settle down to the business of governing; and it was there that the coalition/working together, was challenged.

What is that thing that is so strong that would cause these smaller parties to come together and stay together or govern together after the elections? Nothing just happens; there is a science and art behind coalitions, alliances, partnership being successful.

The other point is, even if they have an agreement, this agreement would not be binding. The ‘Cummingsburg Accord’ was more about the parties’ intention to manage their relationships and to some extent govern, but it is not binding. While the parties have an obligation to each other, even that obligation is voluntary. Can these smaller parties which are still in the process of developing their identity, form a coalition that will be functional?

My recommendation is that our leaders need to recognise that leadership and governance are different. Part of the APNU+AFC and the PPP/C’s problem with their approach to government was that a higher value was not placed on governance, particularly the importance of organization, institution, process, strategy, etc.; and how essential these are to have successful performance.

In order to have real progress as a country, the focus must be on elections but even more importantly, on governance – organization, institution and process. There is need for more analysis on the governance structure and process that would be used to transform the country after the elections. Another very important point, is how will the new Government govern a Guyana; not with a 2, 3 or 4% rise in GDP but with a 32% rise in GDP?

Finally, my call to our political leaders and political parties is to elevate the discourse as to how the country will be governed after the elections. One of the big mistakes both the PPP/C and APNU+AFC made was, to not place enough importance on the right mix of skills, expertise, and people needed to transform the country; political party members, have their place in leadership definitely, but you also need people who understand governance (organisations and institutions - systems, structures and process) in order to achieve goals and objectives.

Yours faithfully, Audreyanna Thomas