Neil Kumar is peeved when he hears the Leader of the Opposition, PNCR leader Robert Corbin complain about the lack of coverage of the opposition by the state media. He says his experience while a councillor of the Region 4 (Demerara/Mahaica) Regional Democratic Council was similar to what the PNCR parliamentarians are complaining of.
In 1992 he said that PPP members were appointed to head the finance and works committee but by 1994 they had been removed because of the questions they asked to ensure transparency and accountability.
He said too that in the information bulletin published by the region you will hardly see any information about the PPP councillors.
However, despite his experience Kumar says that he appreciates the PNCR representatives being named to state boards and other bodies as the government should seek to represent all the people of Guyana. That he says is the legacy of Cheddi Jagan,
Kumar has been a member of the National Assembly for just over a year - a year and about seven days to be exact. He replaced his good friend Navin Chandarpal, with whom he studied political science in the then Soviet Union between 1975-76.
He said that he was reluctant to become a parliamentarian but has found it a forum in which things can get done. About his experience in the National Assembly, Kumar says that he is enjoying it but feels that it must be used to have free and frank discussions in an effort to try and reach a consensus on the issues being discussed. He said that parliamentarians on both sides must accept criticism made in good faith.
Kumar finds the parliamentary library surprisingly good and the librarian exceedingly helpful. He says that he used the library to research topics on local government, agricultural development, sports and human rights, particularly the reports of the Guyana Human Rights Association.
About the facilities, Kumar says that he is not too picky as whatever is convenient and available he can live with. He says that it is the same approach he takes at his office in his capacity as Director of Sports. He said that the accommodation there is basic. But he is unhappy with the facilities at the Oceanview Convention Centre and hopes that when the Assembly resumes sittings at the Public Buildings things will improve.
About the stipend paid to parliamentarians Kumar has little complaints. He says he uses it to make a contribution to his church at Coglan Dam which he has attended since a boy and to help some old people that he has known for a very long time and who look forward to the assistance he provides.
Kumar says that his interest in legislation is in the area of Sport and Local Govern-ment.
He explained that he considers the Neighbourhood Democratic Council, the Regional Democratic Council and the National Assembly as the three seats of power. Consequently, he says that the parties should train people to understand the rules of the various bodies so that they could use them to make a contribution at these levels.
About his relationships with the opposition parliamentarians, Kumar says that they are very good. He says that from his days in the youth arm of the Progressive Youth Organisation (PYO), he has been in contact with members of the PNC's Young Socialist Movement like Corbin, Eugene Gilbert, Wilfred McWilfred and Vincent Alexander.
He explained that he grew up in the Pouderoyen on the West Demerara among Afro-Guyanese. He said that his Afro-Guyanese friends joined the YSM and his Indo-Guyanese friends joined the PYO but he still remained on good terms with his friends in the YSM. As a result he says that he enjoys working with the PNC members.
He says that he is responsible for boosting his party's support in Linden which he did single-handedly before being joined by Dr Roger Luncheon with whom he used to visit the area every weekend.
Kumar who has four children says that his eldest son who is in the third year of a Commonwealth Scholarship in India where he is reading for a degree in Computer Science had friends who were Afro-Guyanese and his younger son who is a student at Queen's College numbers Aubrey Norton's daughter who is in the same class as he, as one of his friends.
A longstanding member of the PPP, Kumar says that he has been in the party's central committee for over two decades and that he was member of the PYO's central committee for about fifteen years.
Kumar is married and besides his two sons the couple has twin girls who are attending primary school. He is a graduate of the University of Guyana Diploma programmes in Communications (1992) and Tourism Studies (1996).
He is the eldest of his parents' eleven children - seven boys and four girls and he attended St Swithin's Anglican School and the West Demerara Secondary School.