President Ali treatment of opposition controlled NDCs attracts criticism

The commissioning on Sunday of the upgraded Burnham Boulevard road in Mocha-Arcadia, East Bank Demerara, normally should have been about the community but has since been overtaken by President Irfaan Ali’s speech that continues to attract criticisms for various reasons.

Guyana has a three-tier system of government- National, Regional and Local- each with its own day-to-day executive/administrative head and support team. At the national level, the responsibility is that of the president and ministers. At the regional level, the regional chairperson and councillors share that responsibility; and at the local level, the mayor (in the towns) or Neighbourhood Democratic Councils (NDCs) chairperson and councillors.

The tiers are clearly outlined in law and come with expectation boundaries will be honoured and the elected leaders respected both at the individual and collective management of Guyana. However, this has not always been the case and most unfortunate given non-compliance hinders executive responsibility/authority and accountability.

The Opposition, A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC), has repeatedly complained that regional and local authorities not won by the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) government are being sidelined or ignored not only in allocation of budgetary resources and infrastructural development but also in efforts to usurp the legal authority of elected representatives.

Villagers of Mocha-Arcadia and others, who watched President Ali’s speech, have expressed concern about his regard or absence thereof for the tiers of government and the people’s elected representatives.

Opposition geographic Member of Parliament (MP), Nima Flue-Bess, in a letter carried in this paper, highlighted several concerns, bringing into the spotlight the conundrum. Present at the Sunday’s event, she said the president was discourteous to NDC Chairman, Rudolph Adams, and instead of respecting him as the local government head has ignored him.

Rudolph Adams

At the event, Adams informed the president that “[i]t’s only when they leave that they are informed that a minister was visiting here. It is really unfortunate.”  His concern was ignored. Speaking to the issue in her letter, the MP questioned: “How can the PPP make claims to democracy and good governance and not be inclusive and respectful of the people’s local representatives?”

Shadow Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, Mr. Ganesh Mahipaul deemed the behaviour a signal from the president of “his unwillingness to respect the Local Democratic Organs of our state, moreso the municipalities and NDCs that are managed by APNU+AFC elected officials.”

At the most explicit, Mahipaul made known “Chairman Adams was clearly requesting for his NDC to be treated the same as the PPP controlled NDCs but clearly the [president] was least interested in respecting the will of the people in Mocha-Arcadia.”

According to the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development’s website, there are ‘two primary objectives of Local Government.’ These are to:- “(i) enable democratic local decision-making and action by, and on behalf of communities; and (ii) promote the social, economic, environmental, and cultural well-being of communities.”