ACROSS this nation, there are Guyanese who would be familiar with the saying, “Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad…”

Guyana’s parliamentary opposition, consisting of A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and the Alliance For Change (AFC), could well experience such self-destruction at new general elections for the apparent political “madness” displayed in the National Assembly last Thursday (July 18, 2013).
That was the date when these parties again misused a one-vote majority in parliament, this time, shockingly,  to shatter Guyana’s long hoped for dream of a multi-billion hydroelectric project, and at the same time defeating a related financial motion.
The motion was to increase the national ceiling on loans to help aid government’s financing of the imaginative development project that has been slowly taking shape at Amaila Falls in the Potaro-Siparuni region of the Essequibo.
The late President Forbes Burnham, founder-leader of the People’s National Congress (PNC), of which David Granger, ex-Brigadier of the Guyana Defence Force, is currently leader, as  well as being chairman of APNU, must have turned in his grave by the opposition collusion to frustrate the realisation of this very significant and much-needed economic  development project at Amaila Falls.
After all, if the parliamentarians of the minority AFC couldn’t care less, at least those within the ranks of APNU, who were quite involved in the politics and governance of the PNC under Burnham’s rule, cannot simply forget—or feign ignorance—of the late President’s courageous efforts, against the odds, to secure domestic and international support for a then envisaged hydroelectric project in the Upper Mazaruni region.
That envisaged project, for which President Burnham was assured of cooperation from the PPP under the leadership of the now late President Cheddi Jagan, was intended to also provide energy for a proposed aluminium smelter at Linden, utilising bauxite produced  by Guyana and Jamaica.
The primary opponent of the Upper Mazaruni hydro electric project in the 1980s was a then government of Venezuela which chose to campaign against Guyana securing the funding from international financial institutions.
The then government in Caracas chose to use the weapon of blackmail against Guyana, by resorting to its old pre-colonial claim that the site for the envisaged hydroelectric project in the Upper Mazaruni region was Venezuela’s and NOT Guyana’s territory!

Tragic irony
The tragic irony in July 2013 is that amid increasingly good,  principled bilateral cooperation between Guyana and Venezuela (thanks to matured, enlightened diplomacy reflecting hemispheric and wider global realities) opposition to this nation’s renewed resolve to push ahead with a hydropower scheme should come, not from abroad, but via the PPP government’s “enemy within”—APNU/AFC coalition
Even more bizarre is that the combined opposition offered NO explanations for voting down both the Bill and Motion. This is the strange, myopic political behaviour from two parties that are crying aloud to be the alternative government to the administration of President Donald Ramotar.
Also, it should not be overlooked that a group of the APNU/AFC parliamentarians had been taken on a tour, less than a month ago, of the site of the Amaila Falls project and, according to media reports, were happy to express “satisfaction” with what they had seen.
In the circumstances, President Ramotar was understandably outraged by the virtual death blows from the opposition to the Bill and Motion, and likened the day’s unprecedented parliamentary session to witnessing “the funeral” of the Amalia Hydro-Electric Project.
Perhaps President Ramotar’s concept of a “funeral” for the Amaila Falls project, following the death blows against the related Bill and Motion from the APNU/AFC coalition, should also be considered in the context of Burnham’s own anxiety to secure the Upper Mazaruni hydroelectric project

Pertinent question
It seems pertinent to ask whether the voting pattern in parliament last Thursday by APNU against  the Amaila hydro-electric project, as well as the related motion to raise the debt ceiling to facilitate funding, were consistent with any prior debate and approval at the level of the PNC’s relevant  decision-making bodies?
For its part, the  Private Sector Commission (PSC), whose credibility has reportedly soared by its unflinching intellectual and moral support for the Amalia`Falls Hydropower project, has  expressed sadness and shock that the APNU/AFC parliamentarians could have so callously demonstrated  opposition in parliament, WITHOUT sharing with the public their reasoning for so doing.
As urged in a media statement on Friday, the PSC’s chairman, Ron Webster, keeps wondering, like his colleagues, why the opposition parties do not tell the public exactly what aspects of the document on the Amaila Falls project the government has shared with them (including confidential information) they do NOT like?  Silence is the response.
The PSC, which has been engaging in talks  with the government and opposition on the need for cooperation to ensure passage of legislation for the  hydro-project, has emphasised that APNU and AFC cannot continue to treat UNSTATED “concerns” as “their best kept secret”.
Perhaps the PSC .and others yet to find out, do not really understand the extent of contempt these two parties seem to have for the Guyanese people. Time will tell.