Latest update April 23rd, 2024 12:59 AM
Feb 21, 2016 APNU Column, Features / Columnists
The upcoming local government elections on March 18, 2016, will give all the municipalities and neighbourhoods in Guyana an opportunity for a fresh start. For the last two decades municipalities and neighbourhoods throughout Guyana – starting with the City of Georgetown – were generally seen as dirty, neglected places. It is apposite to note that the failure of many of these entities to effectively discharge their responsibilities were not of their own making.
The People’s Progressive Party Civic – PPPC – administration while in office determinedly pursued a course of undermining the authority of these local organs. This included starving them of financial resources. Councillors who comprised the six municipalities and 65 NDCs were elected in 1994 for a 3-year term. Today, 22 years later, many find themselves in the same positions. Many of the elected members of these bodies are deceased, migrated, or just simply lost interest or the energy and enthusiasm to perform what is largely civic and community service.
A Partnership for National Unity – APNU – salutes the many honest, hardworking councillors who are still present in our local democratic organs. It is unfair for them to be labelled as the scapegoats for the systemic failures. It is the central government’s obligation – in accordance with articles 77 and 77A of the Constitution of Guyana – to provide finances to local government bodies to enable them to carry out their functions:
– Article 77 states: The development programme of each region shall be integrated into the national development plans, and the Government shall allocate funds to each region to enable it to implement its development programme.
– Article 77A states: Parliament shall by law provide for the formulation and implementation of objective criteria for the purpose of the allocation of resources to, and the garnering of resources by local democratic organs.
The PPPC administration took more than a decade to give effect to this constitutional provision. It’s Fiscal Transfers Bill – entitled “An Act to provide for the objective criteria for the allocation of resources to local authorities …” – was a misnomer. The Bill’s Explanatory Memorandum stated that it “… seeks to give effect to article 77 (A) (sic) of the Constitution”.
The Bill did nothing of the sort. Clause 3 dealt with the garnering of resources by local authorities. Clause 4 set conditions for fiscal transfers. Clause 5 said that “The Minister may establish grants to any local authority”. Clause 6 alluded to “annual subventions or fiscal transfers from central government to local authorities” but offered only a “formula” for eligibility for such transfers and introduced “stipulated performance indicators” as a precondition for fiscal transfers.
The Bill, therefore, did nothing to alter the status quo. Subventions from the central government to local democratic organs remained discretionary and not obligatory. Its title, which professed to provide for objective criteria for the allocation of resources and its claim that it gave effect to article 77 A of the Constitution, were groundless. It did not satisfy the Constitutional requirement nor did it meet the Joint Task Force’s proposal on criteria for allocation of resources to local government bodies.
The recommendation stated clearly that such criteria have to be informed by a premise and identified this to be clear definitions of the functions to be undertaken by the various levels of local government. According to the Task Force, therefore, central government allocations would be on the basis of the functions to be carried out at the various levels.
APNU in the 10th Parliament (in the Special Select Committee) was able to remedy the deficiency in the Bill. A new clause was included, which states: “In arriving at the determination of the annual subvention from central government to local authorities … it is acknowledged that central government has a responsibility to provide financial resources to local authorities to supplement their own revenues and in order to assist them to discharge their functions and responsibilities”.
Local government organs will now be able to bring legal challenges against the central government if they continue to be unreasonably starved of finances.
The PPPC, in its more than 23 years in office, demonstrated that it did not believe in or subscribe to local democracy which is enshrined in the constitution. It (the PPP) has, by its own actions, demonstrated its addiction to centralised control.
When we go to the polls on March 18th we should not reward the architects of the demise of local democracy in Guyana, who now masquerade as the champions of all things democratic. APNU has fought for and delivered local democracy and local government elections to the people of Guyana, and we will continue to fight to ensure that these councils be allowed to operate with autonomy as guaranteed by the constitution.
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