Had Dr. Jagan been buried his body would never stop spinning at the nonsense spouted in his name at Party rallies at Babu Jahn. Vice-President Jagdeo’s most recent efforts remind the party faithful of his reverence for the founder-leader and his legacy is increasingly bizarre. His attempt to align the current reckless pursuit of prosperity for friends, family and favourites with the original clarion call of the Peoples Progressive Party (PPP) for ‘freedom from poverty and inequality in a new world order’ is increasingly unconvincing.
The VP’s attack on NGOs is based on an invented rationale of ‘hate for the PPP’. His version of the purpose of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) goes back to the 1990s when the PPP returned to power which saw the emergence of NGOs in numbers coinciding with the growth of welfare initiatives to ameliorate the Structural Adjustment programme. This approach left the way clear for donor influences on Government to be virtually unchallenged and shifted accountability of governments away from citizens in the direction of financial institutions. Service delivery was established as the norm of civil society organizations. NGOs which engage in policy advocacy were viewed as an irritant to this process which effectively reduced policy matters to ‘technical’ issues which belonged in the domain of ‘experts’.
Marginalizing NGOs from policy matters reflects the PPP obsession with control of organizations of all descriptions. This attitude was known under the former PNC as ‘paramountcy of the party’. The recent onslaught against NGOs that surfaced once again at Babu John was prompted not by criticisms of the Government, but of ‘hatred to the ruling party’. Despite being few and intermittent, critical voices have become visible and audible sources of irritation to an increasingly authoritarian ruling party.
The following extract from an unnamed newspaper columnist in response to a previous similar diatribe from VP Jagdeo captures something of the essence of advocacy NGOs.
….For Jagdeo, therefore to judge NGOs by the metric of constituency size or the number of people they represent is to misunderstand their role in a democratic society. NGOs often operate in spaces where political parties cannot or will not tread. They are the conscience of society, holding governments, corporations, and other powerful entities accountable when they stray from ethical paths. Their value lies in their independence, their willingness to take unpopular positions, and their ability to articulate alternative visions of society that challenge the status quo. It is precisely because they do not have constituencies in the traditional sense that NGOs can speak truth to power without fear of electoral repercussions…
Dr. Jagdeo’s recent call ‘excluding’ the GHRA and other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from financial support from the Government is false since the GHRA has never sought or received funding from the Guyana or any other Government, under this or any other ruling party. However, we believe that the remark reinforces the ruling party’s view of itself as the paramount institution in the country in which State revenue and assets are seen as belonging to the ruling party
In keeping with its obsession with money, the ruling party acts as if every issue, legal or illegal, local or national, personal or organizational is deemed resolvable by sporadic injections of cash grants rather than by seeking policy solutions better aligned to a more sustainable and dignified society. Hence the Vice-President’s boast about ‘increasing the subvention to (favoured) NGOs five-fold’. A more pertinent reference might have been the obscene award of a $865mn contract to an organization cut and pasted together by a social media influencer close to the ruling party.
