RAMOTAR CANNOT DEFEND HIS RECORD; IT’S TIME FOR CHANGE -GRANGER
Opposition and APNU Leader, David Granger is not surprised with President Ramotar’s Saturday announcement that he intends to call General Elections rather than remove his prorogation of Parliament.
Speaking to News Source, just moments after the President’s press conference, Mr. Granger said the President and his government have been preparing for elections all along and his move now to announce a decision to head to the polls should not be surprising to anyone.
“We expected this. The PPP has been preparing for elections all year and the appointment of Clement Rohee as General Secretary of the party was in keeping with their long-term preparations”, the APNU Leader said.
Granger is convinced that Guyanese will pay attention to the issues when they head to the polls. He said President Ramotar cannot defend his record in government and it is time for change that the APNU can provide.
He pointed to the current crime situation, corruption and bad governance as all part of the Ramotar record.
The Opposition Leader said that it was clear that the PPP was in election campaign mood when one looks at “the amount that they have been spending in cash grants and the one laptop project and all of the other programmes, it was all in keeping with their elections campaign.”
“We should not be fooled. What the President did today has been long in coming and the whole cash grant business was held back so that it can have maximum impact for the campaign, and the clean up the country initiative is also meant to have maximum impact for the campaign because people are now expected to be grateful to the PPP but we have not been fooled”, Granger declared.
Mr. Granger noted that throughout his presidency, Mr. Ramotar has refused to meet any agreement with the Opposition on important matters to the nation and instead appeared ready and looking for “a showdown.”
According to Granger, “the PPP was preparing for this a long time and it’s just that the public may not have been fully aware of the PPP’s game. Even the Private Sector Commission may not have realised that the PPP was not looking for any compromise.”
President Donald Ramotar during his press conference said he was willing to meet and have talks with the Opposition on important issues but those efforts were shut down by the Opposition Leader.
The Opposition Leader has consistently said he is not prepared to have any discussions with the government as long as the parliament remained suspended.
He said the PPP government has been coming under increasing scrutiny by the National Assembly for all of its spending, and that was one of the reasons why the President decided to “shut the parliament down”.
Asked about his party’s own preparedness for the elections, Mr. Granger said the APNU is well prepared and will present the issues to the Guyanese people. He said his party has been campaigning for local government elections and therefore is already out meeting with the people and highlighting concerns.
Granger said “the elections are won by the opinions of the electorate and we are convinced that the electorate is pretty fed up with the PPP”.
Filed: 6th December, 2014
