Editorial
Guyana Chronicle
March 28, 2001

ELECTIONS 2001 are over and a clear winner has been announced.

The other parties that have participated in the exercise should now, in all decency, accept gracefully the results as announced by the Guyana Elections Commission and let us all as Guyanese continue the building process started since 1992.

The campaign trail had been a very vigorous one. This is, however, over and the time has come for us to put Guyana first, and allow the dust that emerged from the trail to settle in the quickest possible time, in order for all sectors to charter a clear course ahead.

The rule of law must be respected, and Parliament must be given the chance to play its role as is the case in every democratic society as ours. There are laws governing every society and the state has its agents to make sure that these laws are adhered to by citizens who must not take the law into their own hands or try to do the job of law enforcement officers.

We must learn to appreciate that all of us have our roles to play, and if the job of the police is to maintain law and order, then this they must do without fear or favour.

For too long we have been seeing ourselves as individuals, whether by race, creed, colour, religion or political persuasion, thus widening the gap between each of us.

We cannot, whether politically or economically, develop this beautiful country of ours by doing or believing in our "own thing." This serves to weaken the very fabric of our society and make Guyana the loser.

We must not allow Guyana to be thrown to the wolves. The time has come for all of us as patriots to rethink, and work towards making Guyana a place for all Guyanese to live in harmony.

This could happen only if we respect the democratic process, which we ourselves have put into place, and allow the duly elected government to carry on with the task of nation building with all of us putting in our lot.

Although we have come a long way since independence, we are still relatively young in terms of development. The current government has done quite a bit in the areas of housing, water, health, education and transportation, among other things.

However, this is not enough and the PPP/Civic Government has said it wants to deliver more to the people with the help of everyone.

Guyanese have shown before that together we can surmount any number of hurdles, tasks, regardless how huge, and we can overcome any difficulties as long as we band ourselves as one people with one aim -- to build a bright future for all Guyanese.

We must not allow the sprinkling among our midst to stall any move towards progress in the interest of all the people.

They must be told emphatically that Guyana belongs to all of us, and as Guyanese we have a right to be involved in the building process for our future, our children's future and our children's children's future. Let us in unison march towards building that future.