The SLPP does not need any lecture
Agents of the ruling APC are constantly whining about the opposition not doing its proper duty, about the opposition refusing that they were kicked out of office by the electorate and must admit that they are no longer in government, about the opposition not recognizing the APC government and the opposition or elements of it constantly sabotaging the efforts of the government and so forth.
The latest of these grouses if they could be called as such is an editorial in the pro APC newspaper and mouth piece, the New Citizen in its Tuesday, September 15 edition. The paper begins by repeating the allegation about the recent statement of the SLPP National Chairman John Benjamin regarding the regional imbalance of the APC cabinet, and which statement they describe as inciting.
In the New Citizen editorial referred to above, the opposition is referring to the behaviour of other opposition parties elsewhere especially in the recent financial crisis where it alleges the opposition parties collaborated with the government to solve the crisis. Unless the editor and I have been reading different newspapers, I can think of no instance where David Cameron for example, who is leader of the British Conservative opposition party, has since the outset of the crisis expressed understanding of the Labour government’s position, let alone sympathised with it. When the Labour government like government’s everywhere decided to stimulate the economy by pumping more money into it, did not David Cameron accuse the Chancellor of the Exchequer, David Milliband, of devaluing the value of the Pound by that? Where throughout the last twelve months have the conservatives applauded the government’s effort at taking the country out of recession? Is it not only in times of war or like the September 11th incident that government and opposition speak with one voice?
Is the erudite editor not comparing the Westminster pattern with the American System where quite often members of the Republican party team up with the Democrats to support or oppose a particular legislation, like Obama’s Health Care proposals?
In any case the opposition SLPP has never denied the existence of a global crisis. What we have criticized and done so very emphatically is this government’s handling of the crisis so as to benefit the people. Was that not lacking for most of the recession period? Why was the Indian rice which was bought at concessionary price being sold at the same price as other importers were selling rice but who had no duty waiver? What the government and its supporters did was to put the blame for all the mishaps on the SLPP as being saboteurs.
In my last column I pointed out the gross regional imbalance in the appointment of board chairmen and that was in support of JOB’s accusation for which the New Citizen has also described as inciting. As promised I propose quite soon to publish a list of professionals in support of our case that the government is hell bent not only on “APCilising” the civil service but on northernalising it. I have on two occasions voiced concern at the secrecy with which the Office of Diaspora Affairs in the Presidency is operating. At a time when our universities and other institutions of higher learning continue to turn out graduates, first class ones among them, the government is busy bringing in people, the majority of whom had just been living in the United States to give them jobs, merely because of party loyalty, while leaving our young men and women unemployed. I invite the government to debunk my allegation by publishing a list of such nation-builders, their qualifications and where they are deployed at the expense of our graduates. Until then, the SLPP does not need to be lectured about its responsibility.
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