APNU+AFC proved to be not fit and proper
David Granger’s infamous or famous (depending on your perspective) words have come back to haunt him. Who is fit and proper? Parliament didn’t think the APNU+AFC government was fit and proper, so it voted it out of office.
Even if you do not like the PPP, it is hard to see the ruling two parties that have just been voted out through a no-confidence motion as fit and proper governors. The concatenation of mistakes, incompetence, reckless spending, pulverization of poor people, neoliberal insensitivities, profanities, irregularities, stupidities was overwhelming. It made them not fit and proper to continue.
Where does the analyst start in the enumeration process of the things they did that made them not fit and proper? I will list a sample. This is just my perspective. I would start with the place I know best – University of Guyana. UG is more badly run than when the PPP was in power. In its history, UG never spent money so lavishly and recklessly as we currently see. A poor country like Guyana cannot afford such extravagant outlay of scarce resources and the rundown nature of UG continues.
Next would be law and order and the rule of law. I do not think the judicial system and the rule of law have had their images improved under the APNU+AFC government. Crime and police misconduct may have worsened under the post-2015 dispensation. Improper conduct among power-holders has not abated since the PPP fell. When the PPP was in power, Bheri Ramsarran was removed as minister because he threatened to slap a female activist.
Such a possibility does not exist with this current crop of rulers. In fact, Ramsarran just threatened. There are ministers who would slap, and I doubt they would ever be castigated, much less lose his/her job. In fact, there have been incidents in the interior where at least one minister is said to have assaulted persons. Philistine behaviour that so characterized the PPP’s tenure has continued into the reign of APNU+AFC.
It was a minister that brought the fake Santa Claus into the National Assembly. Minister Broomes’ incident at New Thriving at Providence went unpunished. Ironically, Broomes was one of the speakers selected to argue against the no-confidence motion. That was not a fit and proper thing to do, because Broomes herself makes you want to ask the question if she is fit and proper to hold ministerial office. Volda Lawrence’s dangerous histrionics went unpunished. Justice Holder had a confrontation with the Attorney-General in the High Court.
In so many instances, the APNU+AFC leaders demonstrated that they were not fit and proper to rule Guyana. Lovely puppies were put to death at the Correia airport because passengers arriving at Ogle were told to produce documents to show that the pups were born in Guyana. Passengers were taken by surprise. Had they known about it, then they could have made arrangements to get the necessary papers.
The killing of these pups went on for two consecutive weeks. Even the APNU+AFC rag, the Chronicle, had a conscience and published photographs of the executed pets. Not one minister intervened. That was not surprising. Philistines were elected after 2015 and philistines have no soul. If you have no soul, you cannot love an animal. Philistines are not fit and proper to administer the affairs of state in any country in the world.
The judicial system is in turmoil, but not one minister is capable of seeing what is happening in the magistrates’ courts. After two violent prison uprisings, not one minister of APNU+AFC has spoken out at the nonsense some magistrates are doing. Young, young offenders are being sent to jail for petty crimes. In some instances, such cruel decisions could only have taken place in Guyana. A seventeen-year-old is jailed for four years for stealing $8000. If such judicial abominations had taken place under the PPP’s rule, the AFC and PNC would have run to the world to tell it that Guyana is a hell hole under the PPP.
There are two occasions of the misrule of the APNU+AFC Coalition that I find funny. One is the large billboards around Guyana with the face of the Finance Minister announcing the coming of the 2018 budget. I was driving past Liliendaal and didn’t see it clearly, so I thought it was an advertisement of Jay-Z coming to Guyana.
The other was really hilarious. President Granger, when asked how Dr. Bynoe will run the Energy Department when he isn’t qualified in that area, said; “don’t worry, Bynoe will find people who know about oil and gas.”
People who are not fit and proper lost their jobs on Friday night.