Trinidad & Tobago Guardian
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No change, just exchange
Published: Sun, 2011-01-30 19:56
Asha Javeed
Deputy political leader of the COP Robert Mayers No change. Just exchange. That’s Robert Mayers’ take on the People’s Partnership Government. The outspoken deputy political leader of the Congress of the People (COP) says what exists in T&T was a United National Congress (UNC) Government masquerading as a People’s Partnership (PP) Government. He said on the heels of the Government’s mishandling of the SIA’s directorship, there is brewing dissatisfaction and outright condemnation from key players of the COP—one of the parties of the coalition PP Government.
In this scenario, he said, the COP must extricate itself from the “madness that is the Government” before it loses its credibility. Mayers, in a candid interview with the Sunday Guardian, said the series of missteps that have plagued the PP administration was not the result of a partnership that consults with each other on major decisions which affect the governance of the country and by consequence, the population.
“On May 24, people voted for a People’s Partnership Government and now they’ve gotten a UNC Government. They didn’t vote for that,” said Mayers. Putting his view into context, Mayers explained that his dissatisfaction came from the fact that very little was going on in the economy and the increasing profile of the UNC in the PP. This, he said, had ill-fated the coalition since both the UNC and the People’s National Movement (PNM) carry the stigma of corruption associated with them.
In his view, it’s obvious the Government is ill-prepared for dealing with the challenges ahead. As far as he’s concerned, there’s a limit to how much public relations can sustain the Government given the fallout of the Ramnarine/SIA scandal. “The act of appointing Ramnarine says more than they realise. They treated the post in such a flippant manner. It also shows their treatment of crime is just a joke. They are not serious,” he stated.
From his vantage point, he said, the economy was suffering from the indecisiveness of the PP. ‘Get rid of the PP Govt’ Mayers, a former chairman of the National Alliance for Reconstruction, a coalition Government which defeated the PNM in 1986, said the People’s Partnership had done what it was supposed to do—that was to get rid of the PNM Government. Now, he believes, the time has come to get rid of the People’s Partnership Government. “They can’t stay. We have to move them now,” he said.
He said the goal was to keep trying again until we get it better. He observed that key players in the Government were earning the public’s ire. He illustrated by using Finance Minister Winston Dookeran’s bailout plan for Clico depositors as an example. “How on earth can a Prime Minister go and appoint an inter-ministerial team to re-examine a decision which was made by the Minister of Finance and was approved by both houses (the House of Representatives and the Senate)? They don’t understand the rules of governance,” he said.
What’s clearly lacking in this coalition, he said, are recourse for mis-judgments. As it stands, he observed, there is no institutional framework to support the Partnership except a manifesto presented during the 2010 election and a Memorandum of Understanding signed by the head of all the parties at Charlie King Junction on April 22, 2010.
‘Same old politics’
The Fyzabad declaration was signed by the leaders of the coalition Kamla Persad-Bissessar for the United National Congress (UNC), Winston Dookeran for the Congress of the People (COP), Ashworth Jack for the Tobago Organisation of the People (TOP), Makandal Daaga for the National Joint Action Committee (NJAC) and Errol K Mc Leod for the Movement for Social Justice (MSJ).
That declaration not only stated that only one candidate from the political parties would contest each of the country’s 41 constituencies but it also committed each partner to a specific code of conduct that took into account the constitutional guarantees of Trinidad and Tobago of freedom, justice and equality, with a specific commitment not to enact any laws that interfered with the rights enshrined in the constitution. This, said Mayers, was not what had been happening in the past couple of months.
Lest it seem like continued sour grapes from the COP given that they’ve voiced their discontent about state board appointments and marginalisation of the party in the coalition, Mayers said the PP was badly constructed in the first instance. Shortly after former prime minister Patrick Manning signalled general election, the opposition forces united with the aim to remove the PNM from office. At that time, Mayers was criticised for stating his discontent over the situation.
He was quoted in the Guardian, stating: “Somehow, we’ve been led to believe this unity can be purchased cheaply. That all we need is for Africans and East Indians to work together. That there are a few ignorant people on both sides who are trapped in the prejudices of the past and if the demagogues and politicians who exploit these divisions just go away, all our problems would be solved. Thus we will end up with a PNM vs UNC election fight with a few candidates from COP and other parties being thrown in as backdrop to add a thin veneer to their already distorted concept of ‘unity.’”
His public concern, which now seems prophetic in retrospect, is the same concern now. In this coalition, he said, the COP should have been a protector of national interest. “What we’re experiencing now is the same old politics that drives us apart and the logic hasn’t changed in 50 years. “That is why those of us who believe in a new and different day must begin to mobilise along the lines of a genuine national party with a message of hope and of good governance...That is what the COP is supposed to represent,” he had said.
MORE INFO:
COP candidates elected in 2010 general election
Lincoln Douglas, Lopinot/Bonaire
Anil Roberts, D’Abadie/O’Meara
Carolyn Seepersad-Bachan, San Fernando West
Prakash Ramadhar, St Augustine
Winston Dookeran, Tunapuna
Rodger Samuel, Arima
COP members with portfolios
Winston Dookeran, Minister of Finance
Carolyn Seepersad-Bachan, Minister of Energy
Prakash Ramadhar, Minister of Legal Affairs
Mary King, Minister of Planning and Gender Affairs
