Opposition accuses Government of showing no interest in local democracy, making false promises

The A Partnership of National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) in a statement said it appears as though the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) has just awakened from its slumber and is making false promises to transform Linden, Georgetown, and New Amsterdam. “The PPP does not allow the elected Councillors of local democratic organs to function in the interest of their communities and is therefore unsuitable to manage local government areas and promote local democracy.”

Calling the PPP an incompetent and corrupt regime, the Opposition said the PPP seems to forget that for 21 years they held no Local Government Elections and imposed Interim Management Committees (IMCs) on these local authority areas. “The PPP track record shows that they do not believe in Local Democracy. Their interest is in domination and control so that it can make the PPP elites, friends, families and favourites richer at the expense of the people.”

The PPP needs to be reminded, the Opposition said, that they did not come to government from some vacuum in 2020, pointing out they were in office from 1992 to 2015 and 2020 to 2023. “What that means is that the PPP had 26 years to transform those communities and rather than doing so they stifled local democracy.” It is therefore an idle promise for them to now be offering to transform these communities and their track record does not give people hope, the Opposition pointed out.

The APNU+AFC pointed out that over the years the PPP has starved these communities of resources and discriminated against them. “The PPP actually said through the then Minister Kellawan Lall that they will leave Georgetown to stink [and]it was the APNU+AFC that cleaned and drained Georgetown between 2015 and 2020 thus reducing the high level of flooding. Georgetown is back to flooding under the PPP.”

All Barticians know, the Opposition stated, the APNU+AFC brought genuine development to the municipality. Pointing out that the Coalition made Bartica a town and transform and community which the PPP failed to do in 23 years, and questioned why should the electorate believe them.

The Opposition said it is important for society to recall that in 1992 the PPP inherited funds from the People’s National Congress (PNC) government to rebuild the Soesdyke/Linden Highway. “Through the then Prime Minister Samuel Hinds they said the road did not need repairing. The PPP left the Soesdyke/Linden Highway to fall apart. The PPP failed the people of Linden. It was the said PPP that plunged Linden into blackouts after they sold to one of their cronies, the generator that served Linden.”

It was also pointed out that in 2020 the APNU+AFC left in place a plan and resources to build a new bridge across the Demerara River between Mackenzie and Wismar in Linden which was a transformative project but was abandoned by the PPP.

Further, it was pointed out the APNU+AFC procured resources to build the Wismar to Mabura road which the PPP abandoned.  “It took the international community to force them to go ahead with this transformative project.” Were it not for the Opposition exposing their sinister plans and the insistence by the international community that this road must be done, the PPP would not have been moving ahead with this project, the APNU+AFC stated.

“What is evident is PPP discrimination against these communities and Mahdia also faces the same fate under the PPP regime.” The PPP has no interest in the development of Linden, New Amsterdam, Georgetown, Mahdia and Bartica but merely seeking political control so that it can access and take the waterfront and other properties in these towns and give them to their elites, friends, families and favourites, the Opposition reinforced.