I favour inclusive governance rather than a shared PPP/C and PNCR Cabinet

Dear Editor,

It is not too early to be earnestly thinking of Truth and Reconciliation amongst all our people, for the good of our people and country. No: my head is not in the clouds and my feet off the ground. I am aware that as I write, the biggest hurdle still stands before us – getting to and getting past the eventual Declaration that the PPP/C won our March 02, 2020 elections; that for the next five years the PPP/C will be sitting in the seat of our Government, still-young Irfaan Ali our President and Retired Brigadier Mark Phillips our Prime Minister.

Hanging before us all Guyanese, and particularly the leading members and supporters of our outgoing Coalition Government, is the question of what further dangerous, destructive detours would they take our people and country through. It is evident since December 21, 2018, that there has been much struggling within, between and amongst the various leading personalities of our Coalition and their supporters – a struggle they must resolve within, between and amongst themselves.

Recall the initial acceptance by our Prime Minister Nagamootoo and our President Granger the following day (seemingly so) that the No Confidence Motion of December 21, 2018 had been validly passed and that there would be elections within 90 days. Then, within a few days there began the backtracking and reversals, the frustrating delays and putting our people and country to the razor’s edge in the court cases and the contrived arguments such as 34 not 33 is the required majority of 65. Recall the issue of dual-citizenship which their AG introduced (some say on his own volition and to his own ends), the seeming intention to comply then the sidestepping and eventually after about a month the resignation of four of their Minsters.

Recall also the various thrusts of varying forcefulness to have Mr. Granger sworn in at dawn, as our returning President on the basis of those openly blatant and outrageously fictitious Mingo declarations; the assertions and denials about the “Guyana Dossier” submitted to the USA Government - was it submitted by the Government of Guyana or the APNU+AFC parties in coalition? – the seemingly different initial positions of the President and his Head of his Ministry would not have escaped notice.

We of the PPP and PPP/C and indeed all Guyanese should be forever grateful to the persistent insistence of the Ambassadors of the Western Countries and their Central Governments, former PM Owen Arthur (of Barbados) heading the Commonwealth observers, former PM Bruce Golding (of Jamaica) heading the OAS team, PM Mia Mottley (of Barbados) current Chair of Caricom and a most concerned close neighbour, PM Keith Rowley of Trinidad and Tobago that the Guyanese people and country have so far been spared the travesty of a Mingo declaration.

As we come to the end of our recount, new additional Coalition personalities have jumped in advancing outrageous, outright big-lies about “skinning up” the voting by tens even hundreds of thousands of dead and migrated persons. We have seen in the end a miserly list of 172 claimed dead and migrant voters, many of whom are showing up and showing that they are very much alive and whether migrated or not were very much in Guyana on March 02. The leaders of the Coalition and their supporters should hang their heads in shame, for the first couple they challenged as being out of Guyana have shown that they were in Guyana and claimed that they voted for the Coalition!

Recognizing those discernible contentions hitherto, within, between and amongst the leading personalities of the Coalition and their supporting groups, the question is who/what will prevail from here on? Will they eventually, however reluctantly and grudgingly accept that they lost this one and peacefully leave office? Who knows?

Acknowledging that I came to the political stage of our country relatively recently (mid 1990) and through a side door opened by Dr. Jagan, the PPP and the PPP/C, and aware that I have no office nor authority to speak for any other but myself, nonetheless I will say for Dr. Jagan, the PPP and the PPP/C, that we will always work our hardest so as to earn the votes of approval of all our citizens, at every elections, regardless of their race, colour, class or creed or region of Guyana. However, winning at elections has never been a matter of the be-all and end-all for us. I do not say this lightly: over many decades we have been put to the test and paid our dues many times over in putting people and country first.

In what has occurred in our country since December 21, 2018, we PPP and PPP/C have once again been repeatedly put to the test and paid our dues. Whatever earnest Guyanese might have thought of Mr. Bharrat Jagdeo and Mr. Irfaan Ali before, they must acknowledge and give credit to their patience and tolerance over these 90+ days of working for a true Declaration of our Elections results. I can imagine one of our future historians writing about the 28 years of tolerance and patience of Cheddi and the 100 days of Bharat and Irfaan waiting for the Declaration of Election results.

Cheddi and we of the PPP and the PPP/C have steadily held that in time race could matter less and less, and we could win ever larger numbers of AfroGuyanese to join us, our party. We and our Nation should regret that Forbes and the PNC too readily accepted the view that they couldn’t ever win large numbers of Indo-Guyanese and didn’t consistently try to.

Our younger Guyanese generation may well ask of me, “What do you think are our possibilities after that truthful declaration?” My answer would be “I hope that we get on a road of truth and reconciliation”.

Not wanting to seem evasive as I end, I will give my views on the two main ideas of “Shared Governance” being suggested for our better governance in the short to medium term.

One is essentially a shared Cabinet, including PPP/C, PNC/APNU, AFC and others. The Swiss and Belgian Constitutional arrangements and evolved history may be pointed to and studied as models. But I am in accord with the earlier, longheld instinctive inclination (until a very late change) of Mr Hoyte to not favour a shared PPP and PNC Cabinet – there will be real danger of an irresistible, undefeatable dictatorship; how would the PPP and the PNC go to the next election? Would we not just be moving the dissensions seen in our Parliament/National Assembly to our Cabinet? And if not, why not? Some argue that such arrangements at this time would tend to entrench the present personalities and freeze the current relationships in our society and politics. Further, what we have been taken through by leading members of the Coalition and their supporters since December 21, 2018, would leave questions for some time about their commitment to Nation.

I am more inclined to the view that some amount of adversarial relationship within the boundaries of a “National Spirit” is essential to minimize big mistakes. There is need for two or more independent political parties. So, I would advocate that we soldier on for some time still on the path we were put on (which may be termed “Inclusive Governance”) starting with the reforms that were demanded of Mr Hoyte and continued step by step by us, the PPP/C, whilst we were in Office. Broadly speaking, whilst final decision rests with the Group in office, the opportunities for participation of the Opposition and Civil Society in the Affairs of the State are to be steadily increased in a timely manner, with an increasingly matching access to knowledge and information and resources, and membership of all State and Government Boards, Authorities and Commissions as of a right, and increasing areas of veto rights. More and more, the Group in office, must seek and win the informed approval of the governed.

There are some who argue that the above is a recipe for stagnation for developing countries such as ours (and even for developed countries in times of great and rapid technological and social change). For example, Mr. Henry Ford is said to have said, that when he was thinking of engine driven vehicles, if he had asked someone from the city, what he would like to have, he would have said, “a faster horse” and if he had asked a farmer, he would have said, “a stronger horse”. Just over a hundred years ago, few could then have imagined engine driven vehicles and what they could do.

But you should not put too much weight on my or any other person’s views. Rest easy. Our PPP General Secretary has declared that everything is on the table and the path of development of our governance will flow out of a process of wide and deep consultation amongst all the Guyanese people. Considering what Guyana has gone through since December 21, 2018 there is a greater need now to “Rebuild Trust” much more than when then President Jagdeo adumbrated “Building Trust” in the mid-2000s.

Whatever we do, Truth and Reconciliation would be a great and essential focus and foundation.

Yours faithfully,

Samuel A. A. Hinds

Former Prime Minister and Former President