TODAY, AT the start of a new year and 34 days after the verdict of the electorate at another free and fair national election, it is a pity to note that the two opposition parties in the National Assembly are yet to get their acts together in order for the tripartite initiative mechanism, agreed two weeks ago and involving the government and the parliamentary opposition, to become a reality.
At his regular weekly press briefing on Friday, Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Roger Luncheon, stressed that contrary to an agreement that the governing PPP/C and the opposition APNU and AFC would exchange lists of representatives to address priority issues at a scheduled meeting; such a meeting could not take place as the two other parties were still engaged in dealing with their own unresolved matters.
It is known by the public at large that APNU and AFC are deadlocked in their efforts to arrive at a consensus on the election of a new Speaker of Parliament. They are opposed to the PPP/C’s declared intention to nominate former Speaker  Ralph Ramkarran, the senior counsel who had distinguished himself in presiding over the business of parliament over the past 19 years.
Okay. But in their own frustration to reach agreement, the opposition parties have gone public with their bitter wrangling, and by late last week APNU’s leader, David Granger, went as far as to declare the AFC’s preferred nominee, Moses Nagamootoo, as “not the best person for the job.”
Granger did not explain his criteria that rule out Nagamootoo, but made clear that his party was still in favour of either of its two nominees (Deborah Backer and ‘Cammie’ Ramsaroop), while the AFC’s leader (Raphael Trotman) and presidential candidate (Khemraj Ramjattan) gave no indication of dumping Nagamootoo as the party’s choice as Speaker.
Another problem, though of less importance, that  became a “priority” for APNU, was lack of success to complete its original list of chosen parliamentarians with the inclusion of Aubrey Norton, a former parliamentarian and General Secretary of the PNCR. Put that down to the influence of the PNCR’s leader, Robert Corbin, with whom Norton is known to have had serious internal conflicts. 
The negative factors that seem to have attracted more attention than earlier identified priorities, would include the “boycott politics” in which APNU chose to encourage its youth arm, “Youth Coalition for Transformation” (YCT), following scattered street protests that lacked substance but generated perhaps desired animosity.
As the curtain was being drawn on 2011 last week, YCT, whose ‘transformation’ dimension remains understandably obscure, was boasting of  a “successful boycott” of business enterprises because, it claimed, they were pro-PPP government. The jury remains out on the composition, philosophy and democracy that brought into existence this youth group of doubtful legitimacy. Incidentally, whatever happened to the PNC’s long established Young Socialist Movement (YSM)?
Further, what message is the PNCR and its allies that comprise APNU really sending to the business community, such a vital partner for national economic development, for 2012?
Our hope is that political maturity would trump long nurtured social, political and economic prejudices that still lurk within the bosom of the  PNCR that’s now in new political clothes as APNU, facilitated by a few small and willing allies. Guyana needs peace and political maturity to maintain and expand the pattern of progress that Guyanese of ALL segments of the society have made possible over the past 19 years. Let us keep hope alive for positive developments to move Guyana forward.