By Neil Marks

GUYANA’s two main political parties have dominated national and local politics since the time of Independence, 50 years ago; but now individuals, tired of party dominance, are staking their claim to the country’s system of governance.

Geriet Anthony, 53, is one such person. He is known to residents of Ocean Garden, Meten-Meer-Zorg, West Coast Demerara as a cantankerous character, and that’s in fact the main reason he has the backing of some of the residents there.

“He know fuh talk he way and mek things happen,” said Deoranie Deonarine, using creole refrain to explain that Anthony gets his way around to solve small problems in the community.

Deonarine and her sister, Kamla, are among those backing Anthony for a seat on the council of the Uitvlugt/Tuschen Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC). Under a new system for electing officials, 20 seats are up for grabs at the NDC. Once the councillors are named, they will hold a meeting to elect a chairman and vice-chairman.

Anthony submitted his name to elections officials on Tuesday, and now has to garner support to be voted in when Local Government elections are held on March 18.

Ocean Garden, where Anthony and the Deonarine sisters live, was once a squatting area, but it was regularised by the authorities and now boasts a proper road and potable water. But it’s the frustration of having “no satisfaction” when “advantage” is taken on poorer residents that pushed Anthony to run for a seat on the NDC.

Deoranie said she was “born a PPP,” the party that ruled Guyana from 1992 until last year, when it was unseated by the six-party coalition APNU+AFC. In fact, the neighbourhood remains the PPP’s stronghold, and there is little doubt in anyone’s mind that it would win the NDC.

But Deoranie said it is an uphill task to get PPP officials of the NDC to address in Ocean Garden, nuisances such as blockage of the main thoroughfare by the “rich and powerful” and dumping of garbage in the canals. She said culpable individuals often “pay off” officials and the police, and poor residents have to put up with injustice.
And so, for Deoranie, voting in Mr Anthony is one way of ensuring that ordinary folk have a voice and are part of the decisions being made at the Council.

Ian Preston, 39, an electrical technician, decided to contest the elections for a similar reason. He wants a seat on the Malgre Tout/Meer Zorgen NDC of West Bank Demerara.

It would have been easy for him to join one of the larger parties as a candidate, but he has chosen to go it alone.

“I see it as an opportunity to serve the people. I don’t want to be tied to a party, whereby I would have to support the officials no matter what they do. I want to be free to speak up and not condone wrongdoing,” he said in an interview with the Guyana Chronicle.

Preston has a wife and three children. Apart from better roads and cleaner canals, his dream is for better community playgrounds for children.

“The playfields are full of bush; there is no place for the children to play,” he said.

NDCs are typically constrained by a small budget, and this is a major hindrance to development of communities. The Uitvlugt/Tuschen NDC, for example, gets a government subvention of four million dollars; that’s its only dependable source of financing. The rest of revenue comes from rates and taxes, mainly house and land taxes – if it can get people to pay, that is.

Parmanand Kushial, Vice-Chairman of the NDC, said the last time valuation was done for properties within the seven villages of the NDC was in 1994. Houses have been extended and businesses have grown, but they all pay just the $1,500 a year.

He estimated that 65% of homeowners and businesses pay taxes. Of those who pay, Kushial averages, just 40% pay willingly while the rest pay after they have been written to and threatened – several times – by the NDC. Some just dump the NDC notices and refuse to pay.

The NDC collects a significant amount of taxes from the sugar estate at Uitvlugt; but, Kushial said, the estate stopped paying three years ago, and has ignored pleadings to pay up the thirty million dollars that are owed.
That money, Kushial said, would go a long way in solving some of the problems within the NDC.

He said the council was recently able to acquire an excavator to clean drains, but it has no money to pay an operator to use the excavator. With whatever money it gets, the NDC tries to fill up potholes along streets, clear critical drains, and repair community bridges.

It is left to be seen how, and if, fresh blood in the local government system would fix the problems. For now, just having fresh faces elected to the councils is what matters most.