The United Republican Party (URP) has long argued that Local Government should be separate and distinct from the Central Government. We said that – and most objective people agree with us – because it allows for independence of thought, plans and objectivity. However, the APNU/AFC and the PPP thought best to run candidates that were backed and financed by the major parties. Now that they have gotten the power we see the big mess created. Particularly in Georgetown. The City workers are now striking because of not receiving their salaries. And why is that so? It is a known fact that the central government receives taxes, Lotto earnings, and other revenues from the business in Georgetown. Yet not a cent of those billions of dollars goes into the coffers of the Mayor and City Council. And so, you have workers and councilors who are not being paid, because the City is cash strapped. The reality is this: if the Mayor, Town Clerk and the 98% of the Council were not all PNC/AFC members, the Council could have broached the Government and negotiate for some of the revenues that are brought in from the City businesses, to be systematically awarded to the City treasury. But that will not happen, because it will be seen by the Central Government that the PNC/AFC administrators and Councilors are biting the hand that feeds them (personally). So the ‘top-dogs’ in the offices of the City Council, get their palms greased under the table by the ‘top-dogs’ of the Central Government, and together they live the big life, while the average City worker is left to strike and/or go without their salaries. Have you also noticed that the City garbage is once again beginning to pile up? We all know that the laws which govern the City were constructed by the politically and autocratically brilliant mind of LFS Burnham. The direct correlation between the City administration (especially the Town Clerk) and the Central Government, was a ploy by Burnham, to keep the City of Georgetown under the control of the Presidency. Did we not observe what happened with the Carol Sobba and the PPP issue? At one point, she even refused to purchase gas for the then Mayor, Hamilton Green. The current arrangement is not a progressive one. If left unchecked, the City of Georgetown will continue to languish under the Burnham constructed arrangement – no matter which government takes power. The Mayor and her team just returned from China. It would be informative to hear how the Cities in China operate. Also, the Central Government big-wigs are always jetting-off on expensive trips overseas. Can they not suggest best-practice behaviors so that laws can be instituted to remove the Capital City from under the clutches of the whims and fancies of the Presidency? The URP believes that this unhealthy alliance between the Central and Local Governments is untenable. And we further promise that a URP administration would seek to allow for discussions that would undo what the statuesque now allows.
There is the saying that when America sneezes, the whole world catches a cold. That saying is tied to the reality that the world seems to gobble up whatever is spilled from the US of A. we love their food, their fashion trends and their music. We even love their style of governance. How often we hold up the US freedom of democracy as a bellwether to how the world should operate. However, there has been a slight turning away and decrying of the American-way, with the election of Donald Trump.
The world looked on and wondered for a moment, What Happened? We saw an uneasy shift away from certain, basic, long-held, American ideals, to a more closed-door, imperialist, protectionist form of anti-Semitic, racists rants. This new normal is now called “Trumpism”. I who have long been a supporter of the all-inclusive, big-tent, moral, ideals of the Republican Party, don’t even know this GOP party any more. It was therefore no surprise that over the last few days, when put to a test, Trumpism lost.
America is too much of a multi-racial, multi-ethnic, melting pot, for the kind of cultural warfare that Donald Trump has launched. That approach cannot gain a foothold in the USA. And so, after a full year of holding its nose, America has sneezed, electorally. And I hope and pray that the ripples of that sneeze bathe Guyana. After two years, we as Guyanese have been subjected to a similar culture war, when we were promised different. We have been seeing shakedowns of the many supporters of the last administration. We are seeing the victimization of people who look like the likely supporters of the last administration. And while Guyana has never really been known for its non-racial politics, this constant tugging to the two extremes of the racial divide, is wearing thin on the peoples of Guyana.
Exit polls in the US show that the reason that the Donald Trump kind of politics lost in the recent elections, was because the folks in the middle came out in their numbers, and opposed it. The truth is that the folks who are diehard “Trumpers”, voted to support that un-American ideology. But they lost! And they lost because there are more people voting in America, who understand where they want the country to remain, than those who want to change it, into a racists State.
In Guyana, we have our work cut out for us. Because the challenge is that we seem to have a lot of people who are fighting to keep Guyana as a racist State. There is this dogged solidifying of the people who are content to leave Guyana mired in our racial divide; when everything we know tells us that that is the foremost reason for our blight and stagnation, as a nation.
However, if there was one other takeaway from the recent lost to Trumpism, it is the fact that not only did the swing voters (who wanted to give Trump a chance a year ago), swing back to reality but young people came out in their numbers and voted against the racism and Trump’s cultural-war. That’s what Guyana needs to upset these 50-years of polarized racism. We need the middle/swing voters of Guyana, coupled with the visionary, progressive, optimism of the youths, to turn this ship of racism around. It will not be easy but we can do it.
The exit polls in the US also showed that the majority of voters did not necessarily vote for the Democrat, they just simply voted against Trump and what he stands for. America has sneezed. Let’s hope that come next elections, Guyana catches her cold.