Gov’t says ‘under threat’

– appeals for international support

One year after the new parliamentary dispensation, the Government Information Agency (GINA) has released a report circulated to international and regional bodies.
Below is an abridged version.
After the November 28, 2011, general and regional elections under the proportional representation system, the Peoples’ Progressive Party/ Civic (PPP/ C) won the single largest bloc of votes, and therefore in accordance with the Guyana Constitution, formed the government with 32 seats.
The two opposition parties, the A Party for National Unity (APNU) and the Alliance For Change (AFC) won 26 and seven seats respectively.
The two opposition parties, therefore, have a combined one-seat majority in the National Assembly. This is the first time in Guyana’s history that such a situation has occurred in the legislature.
Parliamentary system
It should be noted that Guyana’s Constitution is based on a hybrid Republican- Westminster parliamentary system headed by an executive president who also heads the parliament, but is not a sitting member of the National Assembly. The Parliament is comprised of the President, the Speaker, the Clerk and the National Assembly.
The National Assembly is made up of 65 Members of Parliament elected under a mixed proportional representation electoral system with 25 seats coming from the 10 administrative geographic regions and 40 from national top up lists.
Members of Parliament are named by the representatives of the lists of the political parties that have won seats in the National Assembly by way of formal notification to the Guyana Elections Commission. This system is clearly defined in the Constitution and in statutes.
The leader of the opposition is provided for in the Guyana Constitution and in statute and is elected by the non-governmental members of Parliament.
The Speaker, Raphael Trotman (at the time representative of the list and the then leader of the AFC, the smallest party with seven seats) and the Deputy Speaker Deborah Backer (an executive member of the APNU, with 26 seats) were elected by majority from these two opposition parliamentary parties at the first sitting on January 12.
The government’s motion of its nominee to the Speaker was defeated. Most interesting is that the government’s nominee for the Speaker was the former Speaker of the previous Ninth Parliament, who both opposition parties had been repeatedly loud in praise of his stewardship.
The president addressed the National Assembly on February 10. The president’s address was debated at the March 15 sitting where the APNU and AFC did not support the motion and abstained from voting. The motion to adopt the president’s address was passed with a vote of 32 to none.
The Standing Orders, in consonance with the concept of inclusionary democracy provided for in the Constitution, explicitly state that there will be parity in the Parliamentary Management Committee chaired by the Speaker. It goes so far as to state that there must be in attendance a minimum of two members each from the government and opposition in order to proceed with the business of a meeting.
The constitutionally created four Parliamentary Standing Sectoral Committees as provided for in the Guyana Constitution and described in the Standing Orders have a 4: 3 distribution of seats in favour of the governing party and chairpersons that rotated annually between the government and opposition.
Revision of Standing Orders At the March 30, sitting, two APNU Members of Parliament tabled motions to the National Assembly which sought to revise the relevant Standing Orders to provide the opposition with a majority in the membership of the Parliamentary Management Committee and the four Sectoral Committees. These motions were sent to the Standing Orders Committee.
The government approached the High Court for a legal interpretation of the provisions of the Constitution and the Standing Orders with regard to the composition of the parliamentary committees to reflect as far as possible the “balance of parties in the National Assembly”. The court did not rule in the government’s favour.
At the all day April 22, 2012 meeting between the two sides, progress appeared to have been made and a draft press release was prepared to that effect.
On the following day, April 23, the APNU and AFC MPs tabled motions to cut the budget by over Gy$20 billion, and went ahead with its proposal.
The government again approached the High Court for a ruling on the reductions to the 2012 budget by the opposition parliamentary political parties. The High Court ruled in the government’s favour, stating that the opposition-controlled National Assembly acted outside its constitutional remit in imposing the cuts to the 2012 Budget.
In this period, the opposition brought several motions which have no legislative effect but which they expect can be used by a majority vote to change the Guyana Constitution and laws such as the President’s Pension and Benefits, removal of service commissions, the courts, the Guyana Elections Commission, as budget agencies etc. There was also a passage of a no-confidence motion against Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee, following the Linden protest.
In addition to the developments outlined, the government has been challenged with politically-driven disturbances organised and led by extreme and fringe elements of the APNU and the AFC, and other bodies to create political instability and reverse the gains that Guyana has made. Two notable events include the Linden and Agricola protests.
Opposition media
Another most ominous development has arisen in this period whereby Guyanese citizens are being targeted for their political persuasion and their ethnicity.
Incitement to violence against Guyanese of Indian descent (the largest ethnic minority) was being promoted on social media such as Facebook and Twitter.
Elements of the media supportive of the opposition parties were also involved in the incitement of racial hostility and the spread of misinformation.
For instance, on one of the influential online media outlets, Demerara Waves, a blog posting calling for the mass murder of Guyanese citizens of Indian descent was not blocked or removed. An Internet radio owned by Mark Benschop, a man who was charged for treason for the assault on the Office of the President in 2002, and who was subsequently pardoned by the president in 2009, also posted race hate and misinformation.
These developments in the Guyana National Assembly over the last 11 months are at their least disturbing and worrying, however, they become more sinister when taken holistically with the consistent undermining and subversion of parliamentary democracy based on “the dictatorship of one” and repeated declarations of the “new dispensation” by the two opposition parties that their supporters are the majority and they must have their day.
Under threat
Examined together with the Linden disturbances (July 18 – August 22, 2012), the Agricola protests (October 11, 15 and 16), and continuous attempts to have similar such road blockages in other areas (which in contrast have had little success thus far), threats of more protests, the targeting of ethnic groups and threats against individuals in government and anyone who publicly defends the government in the social media, the government of Guyana is convinced that Guyana is under threat.
It is therefore again warning, as it did the OAS Permanent Council, friendly international and regional organisations that the developments in the National Assembly and the wider society in Guyana are subverting parliamentary democracy and posing a serious and real threat to political stability.
The Guyana government calls on your organisation to monitor and to consider what statements and postures it may wish to make in support of the protection of parliamentary democracy and the legitimacy of a democratically elected government.