Written by Telesha Ramnarine
PRESIDENT Donald Ramotar, yesterday, assented to three local government bills, namely the Fiscal Transfers Bill 2012, Municipal and District Councils (Amendment) Bill and the Local Government Commission Bill.

Head of the Presidential Secretariat (HPS), Dr. Roger Luncheon made the disclosure to reporters, following his usual post-Cabinet press briefing at Office of the President, Shiv Chanderpaul Drive, Georgetown.
He said he believed the Local Government (Amendment) Bill was the one not given assent, because a lot of controversy took place on the floor of the National Assembly House, at the time of its enactment.
“And I don’t think it has been resolved,” Luncheon stated.
Meanwhile, President Ramotar had said that it was not the lack of political will on the part of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Administration that local government elections were not held in Guyana since 1994.
He had expressed hope for the passage of the four bills that were pending in Parliament.
During a special interview at his office, the Head of State had told the Government Information Agency (GINA) that, despite talks of transparency and compromise by the parliamentary Opposition, they had been showing an extraordinary level of inflexibility and were attempting to change many of the positions that were initially agreed.
“We are the ones who brought back local government elections to Guyana and the fact that we did not have these elections has nothing to do with the lack of will on our part…I know that it is badly needed because many of the problems we face are due to the fact that we did not have local government elections,” he observed.
Prior to 1994, local government elections were last held in 1970. Subsequent to 1994, the elections could not be conducted because of the coincidence with the general and regional elections of 1997.