By Gary Eleazar
Legislative bodies are by their very nature combative, sometimes civilised but often times not. There has, in the past, been physical violence in Parliaments across the world and during his tenure as Speaker of the National Assembly, Raphael Trotman concluded that Guyana’s Parliament would soon descend into physical violence in the House.
Heckling has also been a feature of Members of Parliaments (MPs) across the globe and Guyana’s legislative body is no different—an art form mastered by long time parliamentarian Gail Teixeira and the late People’s National Congress Reform Member, Debbie Backer to name just two.
BIAS
This past week the 65 MPs concluded the Budgetary Approval Process for the Fiscal Year 2022, approving some $552.9B in spending from the national coffers to be executed by the government of the day, the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) administration.
The first day of the debates set the tone for the proceedings to follow when Labour Minister, Joseph Hamilton dismissed the opposition members as “fluttering headless yard fowls.”
By the end of the proceedings parliamentarians had descended to such vulgarity, that instead of the billions of dollars in tax and oil dollars being allocated for spending this year, at least one Opposition MP was suspended from the House for four days.
The events cemented in the minds of many Guyanese however, that the current Speaker of the National Assembly, Manzoor Nadir’s, ‘slip is now showing’. A colloquial Guyanese proverb meant to convey to whomever it is directed, that something such as a woman’s “half-slip”—an undergarment meant to remain hidden from public view or private—was on display.
Speaker Nadir has, from the inception of this session of Parliament, been accused of demonstrating an open bias towards members of the PPP/C and against the opposition.
His actions on December 29 last helped to solidify this view for some, when in one of the more raucous sessions of the National Assembly the Natural Resource Fund Bill was passed.
That Bill was passed despite a deliberate commotion being orchestrated in the House by coalition Members.
HONOURABLE
Annette Ferguson had even grabbed the Mace—the symbol of the Speaker’s authority—but Nadir pressed ahead with a replica Mace in place, held on to by himself and two other parliament staff.
The Late Cheddi Jagan had himself, while in opposition in 1991, also grabbed the Speakers mace during one sitting.
Political pundits argued that the Speaker could have, at any point in time suspended that sitting in order to restore order and decorum to the chambers since the members of the House are elected representatives of the people and are considered ‘Honourable.’
What obtained this week however, was that instead of skillfully scrutinising the $552.9B allocations, MPs were treated to privileged information such as who copied notes from who in school, who ran out of toilet paper while in Law school, one only has one subject passed, who is a nasty man and who needed a dildo (a sex toy).
UNPARLIMANETARY LANGUAGE
On Wednesday when the House resolved into Committee of Supply to consider the Estimates, events took a turn for the worse, as Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, Nigel Dharamlall, sought to defend his ministry’s allocation.
The Minister—true to form—did not miss on any opportunity to fire back at his opposition MPs, including A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC’)s Natasha Sing-Lewis.
The opposition MP while heckling the Minister was seen waving a bag of mints while hurling taunts, to which he responded by telling the MP she is in need of a ‘dildo.’
It would be apposite to note that during the course of the approval process, Speaker Nadir had repeatedly circulated a list of words considered “unparliamentary language.” What was also unambiguous was that despite upbraiding opposition MPs on numerous occasions, including Ganesh Mahipaul, who was reprimanded by the Speaker for his repeated heckling, none was applied to government MPs.
The same yardstick did not apply to government members even while making presentations, including remarks uttered by the Prime Minister, Brigadier (Ret’d) Mark Anthony Phillips, and Minister with responsibility for Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh, and the now infamous ‘dildo’ remark uttered by Minister Dharamlall.
About 10 minutes after Minister Dharamlall’s remarks went unchallenged, the boisterous opposition MP, Sherod Duncan returned to the Chambers and from his seat, proceeded to reprimand, the Minister.
SUSPENDED
Though seated and without an activated microphone at the time, Duncan could be heard loudly protesting Dharamlall’s utterances against a female MP calling him a “nasty man” and that his action was being condoned by the Speaker.
Nadir at the time called on the opposition member to withdraw himself from the House.
Importantly, the National Assembly had at the time resolved itself into the Committee of Supply, nonetheless, seemingly oblivious to this fact at the time, the Speaker proceeded to direct the government Chief Whip, to move a motion under the relevant standing orders to have the MP suspended for four days.
Minister Teixeira complied with the Speaker’s instruction and moved the motion which was, without surprise, approved.
The following day however, MPs would learn that in the haste of the events, the MP had not actually been properly suspended.
The matter was brought to the attention of the House by the AFC Leader, Khemraj Ramjattan, and the matter was later rectified when the Speaker was forced to take the House out of the Committee of Supply in order to properly move the motion and this was done.
Opposition Chief Whip, Christopher Jones, following the initial motion for suspension—since it was determined to be improperly moved and approved—protested the action of the Speaker and his misapplication of the Standing Orders.
VIDEO EVIDENCE
Jones in a letter to the Speaker contended, “we the APNU+AFC Members of Parliament formally wish to bring to your attention issues of grave concern that have occurred as a result of the events of last evening which took place in this Honourable house.”
According to Jones, “of most concern is the misapplication of the Standing Orders in relation to the suspension of Member of Parliament Sherod Duncan.”
He noted that “…you may recall on review and there is enough video footage to support this, that the suspension was done while in the Committee of Supply instead of the larger National Assembly giving the sanctity of the Standing Orders of the Parliament of Guyana we feel this error must be corrected for the record.”
Jones in his lamentations noted “…your decision to suspend Member of Parliament, Sherod Duncan, but find it interesting that the same level of sanction has not been applied to Minister Nigel Dharamlall who is on public record as uttering, while on the floor, one of the vilest comments that could be directed to any female member of Parliament anywhere in the world.”
According to Jones, “this we find totally unacceptable and expect that the same level of censorship will be applied to the offending Minister. It is our hope that you will review your position on both these issues as we understand the difficulty of managing the situation at the time and that you may not have been in possession of all the facts.”
Notably, Minister Dharamlall himself did, subsequent to the incident, conceded to the offending nature of his remarks and apologized, both to the House and on social media, to those who might have been offended.
At the end of the 10-day long process—five days for debates, four for Committee of Supply and one to present—$552.9B was approved for spending by the PPP/C administration, large amounts of which had been approved en-block given the time restrictions compounded by the fact that time was wasted interrogating as little as $2,005 dollars in a $552.9B Budget inclusive of $126B of oil revenue
Source: Kaieteur News