Latest update May 13th, 2024 12:59 AM
Dec 02, 2008 News
“Promises! Promises! Promises!” is the motto of the People’s Progressive Party, according to People’s National Congress Reform executive member Aubrey Norton. He made this remark during the party’s most recent press briefing.
The utterance from Norton was in response to questions from the media which sought to verify whether the President has held true to his promise, during his speech at the opening of the Ninth Parliament, to maintain continued consultations with the opposition parties on important issues.
According to Norton, his party has continuously referred to that promise by the President, but a person must first understand what a speech means to the PPP leadership. “It means fancy language to be taken in by the international community…it does not mean living up to it.”
He said that history has vindicated this position that the party holds, that the PPP does not live up to its commitments. “If you go through that speech you would believe that that speech was presented in Venus or Mars, and here (Earth/Guyana) is a different reality.”
The President, in his address to the Ninth Parliament, had said: “The core elements of the tasks towards political transformation will include constitutional and legislative reforms that will involve all political parties represented in Parliament and the wider civil society…The underlying pillars of the new political framework will include meaningful engagement with all political parties; reform of the legislative and judicial branches of Government; and continuous engagement of the progressive civil society in the governance of this country…We believe that through the exchange of ideas, discussion and respectful debate, there can emerge ideas and suggestions that would further the well being of our people… Therefore, no matter from which side of the House these suggestions emanate, the Government will be receptive towards them.”
The President, when he was sworn in on March 31, 2001, had also promised opposition inclusion in the decision-making process. “It is critical that we engage one another in dialogue…We should always reach out and talk to each other. In this way we would be really fulfilling the mandate of all Guyanese as we share our different views in the search for national consensus on the common objective of making this country a better place for all…
“Together we can work on issues and programmes that really matter to our people. There is so much we can achieve through genuine partnership.”
Chairman of the Alliance For Change, Khemraj Ramjattan, had also recently commented on the promise of the President to have continued consultations with Opposition parties.
According to Ramjattan, the PPP only believed in consulting with the opposition when it was of benefit to them, calling whatever consultations that have already taken place opportunistic.
He pointed to the recent horrors — the Lusignan Massacre and Bartica Slaughters — when there was a rush to have a multi-stakeholder meeting and the Opposition Parliamentary parties were invited.
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