48 years of Republicanism

GUYANA will soon be observing its 48th Anniversary as a republic. A republican form of government is one in which ultimate power resides with the people. When Guyana became a republic in 1970, for us it meant transferring ultimate power from a monarchy to the people of Guyana.

In that regard, our move to republicanism represented a consolidation of our independence, which was attained four years earlier. Guyana was the first Anglophone Caribbean country to declare itself a republic, and is today one of three countries in the sub-region with that status; the others being Dominica and Trinidad and Tobago. Republican status was not only an aspiration, which started with the resistance exerted by the first enslaved. It was a continuous struggle waged for centuries, with an earlier significant marker on the 23rd February, 1763, this as we know, marks the rebellion by Cuffy and the other enslaved in Canje, Berbice.

This was a struggle deeply rooted in the inalienable right of man to be treated as equal in dignity and respect. Some have argued that this rebellion failed, but failure only happens when one’s dream and struggle for the right to self-determination dies. In spite of the odds and hurdles, once persons are prepared to never relent but keep hope alive, they can overcome. Forty-eight years after, celebrations in various forms (calypso competition, children’s costume competition and so forth) mark this significant milestone in our development.

Our national observances, we believe, should be moments for national reflection on the proverbial road travelled, and should be times when the country engages in serious introspection and recollection. This year’s republic anniversary comes two years after we celebrated our 50th Independence Anniversary. As we observed above, in a real sense, republicanism is an extension of independence. We have to admit that as we moved further away from the ethos of independence and republicanism, the nationalism which they engendered has waned considerably. One major factor in this regard has been our intense political divide, which is exacerbated by our ethnic diversity.

The deep partisan political culture has often stood in the way of national cohesion and purpose. This condition has severely hampered our ability to translate our republicanism and independence into socio-economic equality and development. The absence of the leadership of the political opposition from the recent republic observance must once again summon us to the realisation that we have a lot of work to do to make our national motto a reality.

The vacuum created by our lack of political unity has been filled by a sense of alienation on the part of the wider society. Many of our older citizens — the independence generation — have moved on or have retreated into the shadows, while some members of our younger generation have generally kept their distance from any serious commitment to the nation. We must not allow the vibrancy of nationalism to be replaced by political party loyalty, extreme ethnic polarization and a growing individualism.

We feel that the arrest of this national slippage demands the involvement of all our citizens. We need to differentiate between party loyalty and national imperatives; which views the interest of the nation as paramount to those of the party and which is prepared to move beyond the crippling politics of party domination.

Our people have to move beyond sloganeering and reach for a substantive politics that speaks to more than our raw political emotions. If our republicanism must mean anything substantive, it has to begin to invest in, and articulate, the sovereignty of the people, in whom ultimate power resides. This means that the people — all of us — must be empowered in all dimensions.

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