A democratic pact

Cabinet Secretary Dr Roger Luncheon has lamented the inability of the opposition parties- the APNU and the AFC- to follow up with the government’s offer to be part of a Tripartite Committee (along with the government) to discuss some level of consensus on governance policies.

This tripartite initiative was the government’s response to the new dispensation occasioned by its securing the Executive with a minority and the combined opposition having a majority in the Legislature.

This newspaper is on record as being quite sceptical of the government’s magnanimity, which we predicted would be interpreted as weakness by the opposition. It is the prerogative of the Executive, we pointed out, to retain the initiative in formulating the policies that encapsulate their vision for the development of the country. This vision was outlined in their manifesto that was presented to the electorate and it was on this basis that the electorate granted them control of the Executive.

Be that as it may, the government did make the offer and we have seen our position vindicated by the unseemly behaviour of the two opposition parties that are locked in hand-to-hand combat as they jockey for ascendancy in the nascent power relations.

Our fear is that if this motley crew is allowed into the policy-making process, the development of Guyana will grind to a halt as they remain fixated on their internecine power struggle. The Guyanese public should appreciate that while in arithmetic, 26+ 7= 33, the same is not necessarily true in politics. Here unity is not merely a ‘plus sign’ but instead being seized with the political will to look beyond narrow partisan interests and do what is right for the entire country.

The opposition parties had met the president, at the latter’s request, and were supposed to have submitted their plenipotentiaries or ‘High Representatives’ since mid December to facilitate the first meeting of the Tripartite Committee before the end of last year. This was not to be since these personages have still not been identified from the opposition.

The government has long named their representatives. As a result, even the terms of reference of the committee have not been negotiated. This, we believe, is a fortuitous happenstance. We would like to suggest that the goal of this Tripartite Committee should be the crafting of a ‘Democratic Pact’ for a ‘consolidated democracy’ such as had been popularised in the late 1980s when many countries across the globe entered into ‘democratic transitions’.

The language and substance of the pact should be couched in the highest of generalities as to the broad rules to which the political parties should adhere. Such a pact, for instance, should confirm the exclusive role of the Executive in crafting and presenting policies and for the same to be criticised and scrutinised in the Legislature.

This arrangement would expose the opposition to the glare of public opinion as they make their interventions and encourage maturity. If their recent, ignominious behaviour is anything to go by, we can predict that we will all witness the yawning chasm between their grandiose pronouncements made from the campaign platforms and the petty, cavilling horse-trading of their grab for personal power and advancement. This is exemplified in their still unresolved hair pulling and face-scratching to settle on a single candidate to oppose the PPP’s choice for the Speaker’s chair.

Additionally, in the words of Juan Linz, one of the conceptualisers of democratic pacts, a consolidated democracy is one in which “none of the major political actors, parties, or organised interests, forces, or institutions consider[ s] that there is any alternative to the democratic process to gain power and that no political institutions or groups has a claim to veto the action of democratically elected decision makers… To put it simply, democracy must be seen as ‘the only game in town’. ” In such a dispensation, the bullyism implicit in protest marches is verboten.