Presidential Candidate of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Irfaan Ali Sunday afternoon urged party supporters to “sacrifice a little more” for democracy and freedom as he called on the Government to name a date for elections, less than two weeks before the constitutional deadline for elections expires.
“You are taking Guyana into deep, deep, deep crisis,” Ali said to the Government in a speech at Babu Jaan, where the party organised a memorial to the death of its founder Dr Cheddi Jagan.
“Without democracy there can be no economic development, and without economic development can be no social progress,” he declared.
The Government needs the support of the PPP to extend the constitutional deadline for elections. It was only last Friday, two and a half months into the three-month timeline for elections, that President David Granger met with the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) to ascertain a date for elections.
Ali told supporters that it is not time to stand on sidelines and to walk the fence but the time for active participation.
“It is a time for unified struggle” for what he said was a clear singular vision and message that “we shall not allow the boots of dictatorship to trample on us.”
“We must give a little more for our freedom; we must care a little more for our people, we must sacrifice a little more for the greater good of our nation and future,” Ali said in quoting Dr Jagan.
In the region where the Coalition Government closed two sugar estates and put thousands out of work, Ali said that the social and economic consequences would justify the re-opening of the estates once the PPP is returned to office.
“In every difficulty in every hard patch, in every difficult circumstance, the PPP was there with the people,” he stated.
Despite the hardships, he said the most important thing for people is for their to be elections.
He quoted the speech of current Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo during a presentation to the fourth sitting of the 10th Parliament, in which he, Nagamootoo was quoting Dr Jagan.
“A fundamental characteristic of a democracy is when the will of the majority prevails over the will of the minority,” Ali quoted Nagamootoo as stating.
“So Moses what has happened now? Hasn’t the will of 33 prevailed over 32?” he questioned, referring to the 33 votes that trumped 32 votes in the National Assembly and allowed the passage of the No Confidence motion.