Implementing agreed reforms can be big boost to inclusive governance
-Ramsammy tells PPP/C forum
Urges PNC/R return to Parliament
By Miranda La Rose
Stabroek News
August 24, 2002
Minister of Health, Dr Leslie Ramsammy has recommended the immediate return to parliament by the PNC REFORM (PNC/R) and resumption of dialogue between President Bharrat Jagdeo and Opposition Leader Desmond Hoyte as a first step to inclusive governance in the current situation.
At a public forum on the much talked about issue of inclusive governance at Freedom House, Robb Street on Wednesday evening, Ramsammy made ten recommendations as a “starting point on the way forward.”
There were some speakers who felt that both the PPP/C and the PNC/R could make a start by stopping the practice of casting blame on each other for the ills that ail society today.
In his presentation titled `The PPP/C’s commitment to shared or inclusive governance’ Ramsammy urged the PNC/R to return to parliament after the current recess, so that parliament could begin its work of completing enabling legislation and other tasks mandated by the reform process.
Also urging the immediate resumption of the dialogue between President Jagdeo and Mr Hoyte, he suggested they address, as a first step, the parliamentary impasse so as to enable the establishment of the parliamentary management committee and the parliament standing sector committees on constitutional reform, national security, natural resources, social security and foreign affairs.
As another step to inclusive governance, he said, the PNC/R should accept the election results as the views of the people and as Guyana elects a government for a five-year term all must endeavour to work within this five-year framework.
“The prerequisite,” he said, “is the willingness of all to accept free and fair elections as a foundation for a free, democratic and inclusive society.”
Saying that shared or inclusive governance with regard to executive power sharing, had been rejected a long time ago, he said that Leader of the PNC/R, Desmond Hoyte, had unequivocally rejected it and the PPP/C has asserted that splitting executive power is unworkable.
Even though Hoyte recently stated that he was open to discuss an “adjusted” formula for inclusive governance, Ramsammy said, the PNC Leader again shied away from endorsing power sharing.
Ramsammy also recommended the effective functioning of the Ethnic Relations Commission before the end of this year; and the establishment of the Human Rights Commission before the end of the first quarter of 2003, the establishment of the Procurement Commission also by the end of March 2003. The establishment of the Procurement Committee would significantly enhance the accountability environment, he said.
Why next March? Ramsammy said that before the establishment of the commissions the enabling legislation must be drafted and passed in parliament. These commissions have been held up because of the political impasse between the PPP/C and the PNC/R.
Another recommendation he made was for parliament to pass enabling legislation pertaining to guidelines for consultations where necessary. He said, too, that there were several existing mechanisms that could, under the right circumstances, serve to enhance inclusiveness and these included the appointment of shadow ministers. The parliamentary mechanism of shadow ministers is an effective way of consultation and inclusiveness by extending dialogue to government ministers and their counterparts in the opposition. The PPP/C, he said, has offered this mechanism to the opposition and it could contribute to inclusiveness by accepting this offer.
Ramsammy has recommended the resumption of the work of the local government committee “to derive optimum benefits from improved local government.” Local government, as a shared form of governance, he said, has many advantages that would become more pronounced as experience and capacity at local levels improved. He added that genuine efforts to create an inclusive society must weigh heavily on reforms of the local government system so as to promote effective community participation.
He also urged public dialogue on law and order and the implementation of the media committee report.
Noting that an important part of an inclusive society was a free but responsible press, Ramsammy said that Guyana has come a far way since the PNC/R regime when press freedom was completely trampled on. The local press, operating in a generally unregulated environment, he said has been irresponsible and has abused government and the society’s tolerance. However, he said that an informed population was imperative for an inclusive society and the press was still the best means to accomplish this.
In the debate so far, he said, the views of the 54% of the people who voted for the PPP/C seemed to be relegated to the dustbin in all the discussion on inclusive governance. Provisions for the participation of the minority have taken precedence and people seem to forget that shared governance could never mean the relegation of the views of the majority to “some insignificant bother.”
However, he said, the irony was that as the debate over shared governance raged, important provisions for inclusive governance that society has already endorsed languish because of the political impasse and the dishonesty of commentators.
While some claim that the process of constitutional reform was a disappointment, he said, the disappointment had to be the fact that “we have not allowed the full implementation of the provisions for shared governance.”
He charged that the opposition, many commentators and advocates for shared governance have failed to acknowledge the existence of mechanisms and of constitutional provisions that constitute a strong foundation for inclusiveness.
There was no point in talking about further forms of shared governance “when you show no proclivity for allowing those we already have, to work, and to strengthen them.”
The start, he said must be made, by having parliament complete the work it was mandated to do through the reformed constitution but “this must not happen without the PNC playing their proper role in parliament.”
Guyana has been bold and innovative in taking many steps to enhance inclusiveness, however, the “overt effort of the PNC to obtain power and their flirtations with criminal elements and dishonest political commentators stand in the way of shared inclusive governance.”
Speaker of the National Assembly and former Constitution Reform Commission (CRC) member Ralph Ramkarran restated the points he had made a week earlier at another forum on the possibilities of Article 13 of the Constitution.