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Jun 11, 2014 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon
I don’t think there is an independent editor, commentator, analyst and political observer who would refuse to offer an honest comment on what President Ramotar said about the 2011 election results. Speaking last Saturday at his press conference, he said the opposition has a technical majority in Parliament.
Ramotar once publicly asked me in the letter columns of this newspaper what is meant by the “poetic essence of history.” Well I will ask Ramotar to define for all humans who have voted in an election what is meant by a technical majority. He cannot and will not. It is unadulterated nonsense.
There is no such thing as a party winning a technical election or having a technical majority in Parliament. You can have an imposed majority, either by a biased judiciary or through military dictates or a simple rigged majority. But what is a technical majority, especially in a situation where all contestants accepted the results and there was no appeal either to the judiciary or the security forces? In such circumstances, how then did the voting result in a technical majority?
The use of the words “technical majority” in this context then is crass ignorance. For many observers of politics, it is Mr. Ramotar and his usual foolishness. But it is not a laughing matter. Inside his head, Mr. Ramotar has a meaning to the words he used. It is for the analysts to explain to people what he meant.
My belief is that Ramotar, like all others in the PPP hierarchy, has a Freudian rejection of the 2011 election results in the shape of the numbers.
PPP leaders do not accept a one-seat majority of the combined opposition. At the Freudian level, then the PPP did not really lose the general elections, because a one-seat majority is just a technical thing that has no political importance. What the Guyanese people, especially the business community, need to realistically face up to is the brutal fact that once this one-seat majority exists, the presidency and the PPP leadership will not recognize an opposition control of Parliament.
The reality that Guyanese must face is that no Bill passed in Parliament without a substantial input from the Governmental machinery will be assented to. The Guyanese people have to understand that if the economy is crippled tomorrow because of international sanctions over our inadequate anti-laundering legislation, the opposition isn’t going to sign, because the opposition is not prepared to accept the PPP’s Freudian repudiation of their parliamentary majority and in the psychology of the collective PPP, the opposition has a mere “technical majority.”
This is the state of politics, and the sooner stakeholders ranging from the Boy Scouts to the business people realize this morbidity, the better for their state of mind. Despite his allusions to an early national poll because of the impasse over the anti-laundering Bill, President Ramotar is not going to call early elections.
He is a weak leader alright. He plays second fiddle to both senior and PPP leaders. But if there is one thing, Donald Ramotar is inflexible, unshakable and determined about his five-year term.
He will not give in to a general poll before its due date in 2016. Fuelling his damnation against a snap poll is his awareness that there are cabals inside the PPP that do not want him to be the presidential candidate. Ramotar was angry that an ex-champion went behind his back and assured the West Indian Cricket Board that it will get a letter signed by Mr. Ramotar (see my last Thursday column).
It is not only the ex-champion that has his man in waiting for 2016, but others are assured that Mr. Ramotar will not be the PPP’s presidential contestant once there is a national election either in 2014, 2015 or 2016. Mr. Ramotar knows “footnote status” in Guyanese history is awaiting him, moreso if he calls a snap poll and is not the presidential candidate or if he loses again.
There is absolutely no incentive, then, for Mr. Ramotar to ride away before 2016. Those young Turks and the champion’s man better stop dreaming. De Donald isn’t going anywhere.
The scenario then is until 2016, the Government will table Bills, and based on their contents some will be passed like those relating to traffic, roads, agriculture etc. Contentious Bills will be rejected by the Parliament and they will stay on the shelf because the Executive and the PPP cannot and will not accept the “technical majority” of the opposition in the House.
What happens before 2016 is the slow death of a nation.
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