The People’s Progressive Party (PPP), which was elected to government on October 5, 1992, in an election that was hailed as the return of democracy, has reiterated its concern over “the continual erosion of democracy in Guyana.”
The PPP lost the seat of government at the elections of May 11, 2015. Since then, it said, “a dictatorship once again rears its head.”
The party stated: “Currently, anxieties are high on whether future elections are going to be railroaded because of the President’s intransigence on the appointment of a Chairman of Gecom (Guyana Elections Commission).”
The party said its 23 years in office after October 5, 1992, marked the most prosperous period in Guyana’s history, one which was inundated with unprecedented social and infrastructural development positively transforming the country and vastly improving the lives of all Guyanese.
“Guyana became modernized; respectability was restored internationally and freedom permeated across the nation.
“Despite persistent attempts to cause division among our people, national unity prevailed; despite conspiracies with criminals and fringe elements within our society, law and order won out in the end; despite violent street protests, arson, political unrest and many forms of intimidation, stability, social progress and economic prosperity returned to this land,” the PPP stated.
The party said the new era of freedom and prosperity that October 05, 1992, birthed was not easily achieved.
“It was won by heroic, selfless and sustained sacrifices by our people led by the indomitable Founder and Leader of the PPP, Dr Cheddi Jagan and the Party.
“During those struggles, in what has been deemed the dark days of our nation, some who bravely defied the dictatorship, unfortunately, paid the ultimate price with their lives. The nation will forever be grateful for their heroism.
“Guyanese, yearning for freedom and the restoration of their dignity, overwhelmingly broke those shackles through the Ballot Box in 1992; the first free and fair elections in almost three decades in the nation’s history,” the PPP stated.
The PPP accused the Coalition Government of “job deprivation, rampant discrimination, fabricated criminal charges and other artifices are used to suppress.”
The party added: “Broadcasting laws, the SARA Act, oppressive tax legislation, revocation of leases, seizure of private properties, unlawful raids on private homes and business premises by SOCU, flagrant violations of the Constitution, attack on independent constitutional institutions like the Judiciary and the Service Commissions, neglect of the rice industry, closure of the sugar industry, the over-taxation of the mining industry, the stagnation of the forestry sector, the stifling of commerce and trade and many other aspects of our productive, services and economic sectors- all threaten the freedoms of our people and place their very survival at stake.”
The PPP vowed to continue to “struggle to restore constitutional freedoms, respect for the rule of law, economic prosperity and racial unity to this land.”
