Nazir Ally has been a parliamentarian since 2001 and is a member of the Committee of Privilege. He is unhappy at the frequency with which this committee meets. He said that after the three meetings when it was first established, another is still to be called.

He has also been a member of the Select Committee that was established to consider the bill on the movement of cattle. In the parliament Ally says that his interest is in legislation that deals with agriculture and other related issues.

Ally, who is deeply religious, says that his motivation for being in politics is to try to ensure a better life for all Guyanese and to assist people, but because he came from a poor family, he has a driving interest in ensuring that poor people can have a decent life.

As the PNCR's regional representative for Region Six (East Berbice/Corentyne), Ally says, he uses his own transportation to get around his constituency and visits various areas at weekends unless there is an emergency, which would require his attention during the week. Outside of these visits he sees constituents at his office at home.

Ally is one of the region's three representatives in the parliament. The others are PPP/C parliamentarians Ramesh Rajkumar and Khemraj Ramjattan. Rajkumar was were featured in a previous issue of Current Affairs.

Among the problems which plague the region, Ally cites the high unemployment among young people on leaving school, water problems in the Number 51 to Number 53 areas, flooding in the Fyrish area as a result of the flooding of the outfalls, and the substandard work done on the roads in the Crabwood Creek area.

Ally says that in trying to find solutions to these problems he relates among others, to the regional chairman, the local councillors and the various subject ministries. He is disappointed that there is not more collaboration and cooperation with his regional parliamentary colleagues. He claims that they do not invite him to meetings that deal with problems in the various areas even though he has a good rapport with them generally.

Ally, 63, was a member of the Progressive Youth Organisation (1960-1965), the youth arm of the PPP and was a member of its executive committee.

He changed parties in 1970 when he joined the PNC.

Ally resides at Corriverton where he has lived all his life and is the father of three grown children - two sons and a daughter. He attended the Corriverton Primary School, Skeldon High School and the Teachers' Training College.

Ally has had a varied career. He is a trained teacher and retired at the end of January 1996. He has taught at Skeldon, Corriverton, Massiah and Number 68 Primary Schools. He has also been a small rice farmer and a pest control officer. At present, he is a Justice of the Peace, a Commissioner of Oaths and Affidavits, a cattle farmer as well as the operator of two tapirs - the preferred mode of public transportation between the villages on the upper Corentyne coast.

Since joining the PNC in 1970, Ally has served in various positions. He has been its regional chairman for the past five-odd years, and his region's representative on the party's central executive committee. He has also served as district coordinator and regional secretary during time that the party's General Secretary, Oscar Clarke, was regional minister for the East Berbice region.

He attended the party's Developers Course at Timehri between 1974-75 where he was exposed to the party's policies and programmes and its ideological and philosophical underpinnings.

He is a former deputy mayor of Corriverton, a position in which he served between 1992-1994 and was a member of the Central Housing and Planning Authority.