It has been months since members of the parliamentary opposition met as a collective to discuss issues and strategize the way forward. In fact, this publication has been able to confirm with several members that meetings, over the past year, have been held few and far apart.
This state of affairs has caused much worry amongst the group.
Immense concern continues to develop as the lack of meetings is now resulting in public division.
It has been over three months since the last meeting was held for Members of Parliament (MP) who represent the APNU+AFC.
One MP who spoke on the grounds of anonymity said, “This means three months of Norton not listening to our concerns as a group, three months of him not giving us clear direction, three months of us not sitting together and discussing our views on certain matters.”
The Member of Parliament opined that the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) government is “getting away with murder and we are sitting idlily, basically watching the ride.”
To explain the severity of point regarding lack of meetings, the parliamentarian noted the recent public spectacle where senior MPs aired vastly opposing views.
Just last week, Norton publicly contradicted his shadow Attorney General, Roysdale Forde who requested that the government provide a copy of the investigative report that details the mishandling of an audit into ExxonMobil’s US$1.7B expenses.
Norton said he had no interest in seeing the report and that Forde’s position did not reflect the will of the opposition.
The APNU+AFC MP who spoke to Guyana Standard said, “that audit issue is a major one, we should have had our ducks in a row but we showed the public that we do not have a united position.” The politician said that weekly or bi-monthly meetings would help to avoid such public embarrassment. “If we meet, discuss our views, and leave on the same page, it will be better for us all. We will not always see things the same way but at least we should know what is going on.”
Guyana Standard spoke to other MPs who confirmed the lack of regular meetings.
One senior MP said, “I will not speak much on this issue but I can confirm we haven’t been meeting. The government meets weekly and I believe we ought to meet regularly as well. We are shooting ourselves in the foot.”
This publication understands that the matter has been raised with Norton several times before. But to no avail. While the PNCR meets, this publication understands that there have been issues with regular meetings there as well. “The Central Executive Committee meets but we had a hiatus too. It is only recently that we started meeting a bit more regular and some members are not always invited.”
A PNC member said, “I do not know what is the comrade’s aversion to meetings, you ain’t see he doesn’t even want to meet you guys’ (the media) face to face?”
Norton has never held regular in person meetings with the media ever since becoming Leader of the Opposition. All press conferences are held via zoom.