Category: Editorials

After a lost year in Guyana’s politics following the 2011 elections, some politicians and political analysts have revived talk of a ‘coalition government’ representing the major voting blocs in a country. Even though they may not have explicitly used the terms, essentially they are proposing the ‘power-sharing’ option that has been suggested for ‘divided’ societies. Kenya is one such society, but after independence, it avoided most of the excesses that bedevilled other countries in the same boat. However, after its 2007 elections, ethnic hostilities took 1200 lives and displaced 600,000…

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The clamour made by the Kaieteur News, and particularly its owner Glenn Lall, about media ownership in Guyana is clearly nothing more than a vindictive obsession with individuals who have dared to achieve not only in business in general, but yes – in media operations as well! Concentration of media ownership or media consolidation – a process whereby progressively fewer individuals or organisations control increasing shares of the media – has become a feature in many countries, including in the Caribbean. Globally, large media conglomerates include Viacom, CBS Corporation, Time…

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The UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) was in the news, which is a bit of an anomaly recently. Its executive secretary, Alicia Bárcena was in Cuba, highlighting the role of planning in the region’s development at a seminar to reflect on 50 years since the first economic plan in Cuba. There were representatives from several other Latin American states, primarily from those that would be called ‘leftist’, but sadly none from the Caribbean. It was reported that the executive secretary emphasised: “Planning is an essential…

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Over the past three decades, globalisation has been fuelled by the spectacular advances in information and communications technology. The factories in China that began to churn out consumer products for western entrepreneurs in the 1980’ s would not have been possible without, for instance, the fax machine that enabled computer engineers in, say, New York City, to communicate detailed instructions in graphic form almost instantaneously. But what is often forgotten is that over in China, the individuals working in the factories had to be capable of comprehending the schematics and…

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The CEO of GuySuCo has just revealed, according to the state-owned Chronicle, that the ‘grinding’ of sugar for the ‘first crop’, has commenced in the Demerara estates of the troubled sugar industry this week. This reverses the age old practice where the Berbice estates would get the ball rolling, followed by those in Demerara. That practice was not arbitrary but established by the exigencies of the weather: Berbice had a longer and earlier dry season than Demerara. Between the breaks in the two crops (occasioned by the two wet seasons)…

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Small and medium enterprises (SME’s) represent a significant share of emerging economies’ business fabric – including that of Guyana and the Caribbean. Nevertheless, they continue to face multiple challenges in meeting their financing needs. While there have not been any definitive studies for Guyana, we most likely match Latin America where SME’s account for nearly 99% of businesses and employ up to 67% of its employees. Access to finance for Guyanese firms in general is extremely unequal – with the largest business conglomerates owning their own banks. Most small businesses…

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In our system of governance, the office of Speaker of the House of Assembly calls for the utmost impartiality and implies that the holder of the office is capable of relinquishing his political affiliation to any party. The Speaker has to resolve the dilemma of his political affiliation and the simultaneous need to show neutrality in carrying out his functions. He is first and foremost supposed to act as an arbitrator who never appears as the sectarian representative of a party. This explains the moral authority attached to his decisions.…

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The movie “Zero Dark Thirty” (ZD30) was nominated for five Oscars last week. It claims to ‘tell the story’ of how the CIA hunted down and finally assassinated Osama bin Laden, the head of Al Qaeda,  behind the World Trade Centre destruction. By boasting that it is “based on first-hand accounts of actual events,” and intermittently using footage of real-life events such as voices of victims of 9/11, it clearly intends to tell the story ‘as it is’. From this perspective, we cannot escape the question that the ‘story’ places…

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In 2000, after PNC inspired street protests and riots precipitated wide-scale changes in the Guyana Constitution, the following was inserted as Art 197A (5): Disciplined forces commissions may be constituted by the National Assembly from time to time, as may be necessary, with power to examine the structure and composition of the disciplined forces and make recommendations generally with a view to promoting their greater efficiency, and giving effect to the need in the public interest that the composition of the disciplined forces take account of the ethnic constituents of…

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The Caribbean has a proud history of rebellion against inhuman ‘peculiar institution’ – slavery. It is important to note that this rebellious spirit in the service of justice and equality was not only waged in the early days and only by recent arrivals from the African continent. During the lead-up to the emancipation of slavery in British colonies on August 1834, when the emancipation movement had already gained a head of steam in England, there were three great rebellions by Creoles i.e. native-born slaves in the Caribbean – in Barbados,…

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