Descent into Irrelevance... (COP Votes etc.)

On Sunday September 9th the Congress of the People engaged in theatre so convincing many of the members who were present as observers may have mistakenly led themselves to believe it real, but how could it be? Every one of the people who spoke 'for' the government and 'against' the substantive motion (and arguably the reason many who had heretofore given up on the party had even bothered to show up) brought by Vernon De Lima to insist that the party stand by its founding principles and force the Prime Minister to remove Jack Warner from the cabinet or face the spectre of another departing coalition member were and are also (coincidentally) the COP members who are 'eating ah food' at the government table, which naturally begs how then could the matter have been dealt with fairly? Wasn't this a classic case of conflict of interest on an extremely personal level? Surely anyone so compromised and beholding should never have been trusted to decide on an issue in which they have a financial or other personal stake and instead should have stated their conflict and excused themselves from the deliberations, not so? And as this was not done, who then spoke on behalf of the interest of the members?  It was pellucidly clear to all present (and based on their past utterances) that instead of voting party or country their positions could have only been based on selfish interest and if based on the above mentioned conflict the subsequent vote skewed, how then could the whole charade be considered free and fair democracy at work?

What took place leading up to the debate was a classic example of what power does to otherwise good people, and rumors abounded of open campaigning and negotiations during the week leading up to the debate to influence the outcome. Openly hostile to anyone they perceived as supporting either the motion or Mr. De Lima, the political leader Prakash Ramadhar, party chairman Joseph Toney and the rest of the cabal who are slowly deflating brand COP and consigning the notion of 'new politics' to the grave wasted an entire Sunday in semantics and irrelevance designed to frustrate what in the end culminated in their troops carrying the day but did not in anyway reflect the will of the voters who put the COP into office.  As if smelling a rat from the get go and to head off what was plainly a predetermined outcome, motion mover De Lima tried to have the party's Article Fifteen triggered which would have seen the motion debated by the party's entire membership through the convening of a national assembly in a referendum on the matter rather than just the National Council delegates, but this was forcefully resisted by the leadership causing many to question (again) why would the party that introduced referendum to the national discussion be so unwilling to use it?

To hear Prakash Ramadhar speak one would think that he was a stickler for due process and that unless and until the subject of the motion Jack Warner is charged or even convicted his hands are tied, but without even a charge much less a conviction the Congress of the People went after Patrick Manning and his government with zeal and fervor based on nothing but allegation and speculation and none more so than the now pious Prakash, so the question has to be asked, who tied his hands? The very same Prakash who (for reasons still unclear or explained) referred to the Opposition Leader Dr. Keith Rowley as a corbeaux during the vote of no confidence debate is the same Prakash who wants people to believe that he is defending Jack Warner solely out of a lack of any conviction despite the tsunami of implications, allegations, investigations, court judgements and other damning evidence? Really Prakash?

Like many organizations that use the word 'democracy' conveniently, what took place at Sunday's Congress of the People's National Council was anything but real democracy at work and based on the deception that was openly displayed and the flouting of the party's past precedents and espoused principles it is my view that what remains of that party is alive now in name only and ought not to be considered important to the national politics perhaps outside of being at best a UNC party group.