Witch-hunt only becomes witch-hunt when there is no evidence

One of the theories being offered for the absence of information on the plethora of forensic audits which begun shortly after the APNU+AFC took office is that the ruling coalition wants to avoid charges of witch-hunt by the PPP. If that is so, then it is terrible strategizing and moral back-sliding. Last week, the President of Brazil was indicted for corruption. Was someone out to get former President Lula?
If ruling parties are afraid of prosecuting corrupt former rulers, then why do they want to have power in the first place? If the ruling Coalition is going to become intimidated by mischievous and wicked fictions thrown at them by the PPP, then there was no reason for them to have sought power in the first place. What do APNU and AFC leaders think the PPP in opposition will do? Support them? Cheer them on with bouquets?  Fill up the letter pages of the newspapers with praise for a good job being done?
Politics has similarities with many other areas of life, and this includes business management. If I want you to give me two million for my land, I am not going to ask for one million. I will be extravagant. I am going to ask for 12. You will reject that, but you will be under enormous pressure not to go way down to one. So what you do? You go way below 12 and you go as low as two. I get what I set out to achieve in the first place. Had I initially asked for two million, you would have said 500,000.
If the opposition rejects their one seat on state boards and demands four, and you give them three, you have been outfoxed. If, as Dr. David Hinds says he believes, the Coalition has slowed down the audits because of fear of cries of witch-hunt from the PPP, then the Coalition won’t be in power for too long.
A ruling party cannot respond to every demand of an opposition, because that is the nature of an opposition; they go for the jugular. That is the language they understand, that is the demand their constituencies make of them, that is the nature of politics. An opposition is going to cry foul when there is no need to, because it feeds the emotions of its constituencies. Surely, the Coalition must be watching the circus with Donald Trump. Trump will go to redneck lands and say the most bigoted things, because those kinds of folks want to hear that language.
There are huge differences in the political culture of countries on the map. Guyana’s politics is very complex. The PPP is not your run-of-the-mill party. It was born with enormous myths and has evolved with a culture of mythology that reinforces its messianic mentality. It is not the kind of party that believes in the essential traits of democracy.
As much as we hate violent right-wing, racist parties in Europe, it would be unthinkable for the leadership of those parties not to have a membership vote on leadership change. The National Front’s membership in France elected its current leader. The PPP cannot imagine such a process in its biology. PPP leaders will not go to its membership and ask them to vote in a leadership contest. That is not the way the PPP understands democracy.
If there weren’t forensic audits, the PPP would have found another thing and labelled it witch-hunt. If the Coalition thinks that after it slows down the audits, the PPP will slow down its propaganda, then the Coalition leaders know absolutely nothing about politics. Maybe Alston Stewart, the AFC’s wonder boy from Jamaica, will have to be summoned to Georgetown to continue teaching Guyanese leaders how to think for themselves.
Witch-hunt is the use of state resources to persecute people who oppose authoritarian governance. Anti-corruption investigation after dictatorship falls is a totally different world, a different concept. Anti-corruption action is the moral obligation to people and country to bring justice to a nation by prosecuting people who committed acts of grave criminality. Governments do not compromise on the pursuit of justice for short term electoral gains.
This is a no-win situation. First, it emboldens your enemy because you are perceived as weak. Secondly, it lacerates the psyche of your supports who feel betrayed. Thirdly, you may end up as fools because you are deluding yourself into thinking that appeasement will convert PPP constituencies to your cause. Maybe in other countries, but not in ethnically-driven Guyana.  Fourthly, your anticipated 2020 electoral gain may elude you, because your own supporters may not vote next time.