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Challenging year 2012: A year in review in the Caribbean Community
In Belize, Prime Minister Dean Barrow narrowly avoided defeat – his United Democratic Party (UDP) won the March 7 general election by one seat.
Political machinations and survival strategies kept some Caribbean administrations in office.
In Guyana, where the opposition parties control 33 of the 65 seats in the National Assembly, legislators from all sides sought to garner support from the international community during 2012 over what they claimed to be relentless attacks on parliamentary democracy in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) country. Frustrated by the opposition’s strategies, the government of President Donald Ramotar went to the courts in a bid to overturn decisions initiated by the opposition and has also called on the international community to monitor and “consider statements and postures it may wish to make in support of the protection of parliamentary democracy and the legitimacy of the democratically elected government in Guyana”.
In Grenada, Prime Minister Tillman Thomas prorogued parliament in the face of a second vote of no confidence in 2012. The first, filed in April, had been brought by the main opposition New National Party (NNP) of Dr. Keith Mitchell and although the National Democratic Congress (NDC) of Prime Minister Thomas closed ranks in defeating the motion, the second in September was brought by Thomas’s former foreign affairs minister Karl Hood.
Like McKeeva Bush, 2012 has turned out to be an “annus horribilis” for Mr. Thomas, who came to power in 2008 leading the NDC to an 11-4 victory at the polls.
In September, Thomas accused several party members including former tourism minister Peter David, Hood and prominent trade unionist Chester Humphrey of working in cohorts with the opposition NNP, resulting in their expulsion from the NDC.
The move further crippled the NDC, which saw its majority in the parliament dwindle to 6 and the subsequent formation of the National United Front (NUF), comprising many of the expelled NDC members, who are now promising to provide an alternative “third way” to the NDC and the NNP parties.
The year 2012 concludes with there not being a parliamentary sitting in Grenada since July – despite calls for Prime Minister Thomas to re-convene parliament. The country’s constitution notes that the parliament must have at least one sitting during a six-month period – failure to do so, could result in the Head of State dissolving parliament and calling for fresh elections.
