What is Facing the Future?

‘Facing the Future’  represents the coming together of a number of Guyanese organizations concerned to make the political process , starting with the elections system, more ‘user-friendly’ to citizens.  We don’t have the answers, but we believe that, if citizens start to engage with each other and with political parties, we can create a political system more responsive  to the need of citizens and more accountable to them. In this way citizens can assert greater influence over the kind of society Guyana will become.

Facing the Future aims:

• To secure progress by fostering a sense of inclusiveness that embraces all Guyanese
• Ethnic background should have no more significance than height or weight.
• Equality of sexes in all walks of life should be a priority.

Specifically the campaign aims:

• To provide opportunities to young citizens to engage with political life through involvement with community-level problems.
• To secure specific electoral reforms achievable in the short time prior to elections.
• To create greater awareness of the need for a more inclusive political system.
  

Considering  our:

• Wealth of natural resources
• Ideal geographical location
• Manageable landscape and fertile soil
• Large land area and small population

Considering also that we:

• Speak the world’s leading language
• have multiple diverse cultures
• Are a warm, talented people.

What is preventing Guyana being a society in which all Guyanese:

• feel included
• feel at home
• want to live and work and build their future ??

Almost all ambitious and energetic Guyanese who want to make something of their lives have thought at some time or other of migrating. More Guyanese now live abroad than in Guyana. The loss of qualified Guyanese includes over 85% of each year’s graduates from UG.

Our failure to create a society which attracts rather than repels people is linked to our failure to develop a political system in which all Guyanese feel equally included all of the time. There is a widespread perception – valid or not, that whichever party is in power favours its own ethnic supporters with: jobs, scholarships, house-lots and with contracts.   The sector of the population whose party is not in power believes they have no influence over important decisions that affect their future.

With elections approaching once again, Guyanese can either take steps towards helping create a more inclusive, accountable, unified and fair form of government which everyone can feel good about, or we can continue to drift along a path marked by lack of choices, ethnic suspicion, low levels of development and eventually, migration.