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The Alliance For Change (AFC) believes that the on-going Cabinet outreaches that have been initiated by the Government sends a clear signal that President Bharrat Jagdeo may be ready to call elections while opposition parties are distracted from preparing for the upcoming polls by issues surrounding the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM).
In an interview with Kaieteur News, AFC's Presidential Candidate Raphael Trotman said this is just another sinister plot that the AFC has ignored and has set about with its own campaign strategy.
“We believe that it is a bit of mischief on the part of the PPP and a trap that we want to avoid falling into,” Trotman said.
He posited that the recent Cabinet outreach is really a vulgar attempt to disguise blatant campaigning and an attempt by the government to steal a march on the rest of the contesting parties.
“It is obvious that tax payers' monies are being used to campaign. I don't know how a cabinet could be going into outreach when parliament has ended. You are more or less a caretaker-type situation so no cabinet could be settling down to work out any programmes; they are really in a caretaker mode since parliament has been dissolved.
“The outreach programmes and the fact that the President has not traveled to the CARICOM Heads of Government Conference and other indicators tell us that the President is about to announce elections.”
In an invited comment, Information Liaison to the President Robert Persaud noted that the Cabinet outreach programme is a new format of the PPP which was started by President Jagdeo in 1999.
“We have no apology for extending development in all the regions. The opposition parties would like to see the government not do this so that they could use the lack of action to campaign,” Persaud posited.
He added that the government still has to “serve the people” even as parliament is dissolved.
“Cabinet outreaches have no link to elections,” Persaud said.
He said the Cabinet outreaches were really an opportunity to allow the people on the ground to interact with Government Ministers.
Poll preparations
Trotman posited that the AFC is concerned about the issues surrounding poll preparations but will not be pulled into a debate since the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) has set about preparing for the hosting of elections despite the various concerns about the voters' list.
“We are concerned about elections and we are just as deeply concerned about making sure we are prepared ourselves. We believe that the PPP is deliberately stoking the coals of these burning issues so as to create distractions, so that when you would have awoken sometime mid-July you hear that the President has announced nomination day, leaving you flat-footed,” Trotman stated.
Persaud debunked these claims, stating that the President will only call elections once he had gotten the go-ahead from GECOM.
Trotman contends that the AFC had to make a decision whether they were going to meet the PPP mischief head-on or divert attention elsewhere to matters which are being discussed by the other parties.
“We don't have the institutional capacity of the PNCR to wage two or three battles at the same time. We choose the battle that we could fight best and that is to prepare for the elections,” Trotman said.
As it relates to the ongoing debate over residency requirements for voters, Trotman posited that the opposition parties needed to accept that the Government and GECOM is prepared to go ahead with elections and the recent stance taken by the donor community is also an indication that several burning issues will not be addressed in time for elections.
“You can either settle down or go with what is happening…or you can take a decision not to engage at all, but for such a decision to have an effect it has to be a collective decision of all opposition parties. For so long as two accept that they would not accept the rules of engagement and six decide that they are, then it will make a mockery,” Trotman stated.
He further called for a meeting of all the contesting parties, including the PPP, to sit with GECOM so that all the burning issues could be ironed out and for contestants to decide if they will continue.
Trotman noted that GECOM has been tasked with delivering free and fair elections and the AFC expects this to happen.
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