Saturday June 21, 2014
Kaieteur News
Page 5
Letters... Where your views make the news Letters... Where your views make the news
The PPP/C cannot easily be defeated at any new elections DEAR EDITOR, I recently read on the internet, a letter written by Dr. Asquith Rose and Harish S. Singh, which was published on May 5 in the Stabroek News under the caption “PPP Government cannot win a majority in any new elections”. In that letter the authors stated ‘‘we can say with much certainty that the PPP cannot win a majority in any new elections. For one reason, the AFC has changed the political dynamics/landscape in Guyana. For another, the East Indian population on the Corentyne which is the PPP stronghold has been drastically reduced by 22% due largely to migration. ‘’ My opinion is that this shows lack of knowledge on the political background of this country. Everyone knows that the AFC (Alliance
For Change) does not have the support base to win an outright majority at any elections for two main reasons: (1) elections in Guyana is more about race rather than party ideology and (2) East Indians, who represent 47 percent of the population, vote en masse for the PPP, regardless if the country is being poorly run. This Government cannot be easily defeated, as ethnic voting remains entrenched. Guyana is a nation that is politically and racially divided. The is primarily due to the split of the PPP (People’s Progressive Party) along racial lines, due to differences in political views between the two main party leaders, Dr. Cheddi Jagan and Mr. Forbes Burnham. The split resulted in Jagan continuing to lead the PPP and Burnham forming the People’s National
Congress (PNC). Racial considerations have since dominated elections, as the PPP became an East Indianbased party and the PNC derived its following from the African community. Some politicians use racism to gain political millage which destroys the country. We as Guyanese cannot represent our nation’s motto ‘One People, One Nation, One Destiny ‘ because we don’t live together as one. Everything in Guyana is about race and this is why the PPP Government which is being supported by largest ethnic group of people in our society - regardless of the high cost of living, high unemployment rate, high crime rate, poor health care system, poor education, bad governance and mismanagement of our taxpayer money among other things - can never lose any
new elections in Guyana. There is no doubt that race was effectively used to construct and sustain the PPP/C Government’s dictatorship for over twentyone after the 1992 general elections. Had Dr. Asquith Rose and Harish S. Singh known different, they would never have said that the PPP cannot win a majority in any new elections. We must remember when
and dialogue that would otherwise dissipate in London, Rio or New York, is alive in Georgetown. In sum, Kissoon has brought the people of the street into his column and has taken his column to the streets. The state and the PPP are not the exclusive targets of Kissoon’s unwavering and roving pen. His column and the regular letter to the press attack the contradictions and follies in other parties, sectors and individuals, including the PNC, AFC, WPA, trade unions, police force, private sector, and foreign diplomats and interests. His range of topic is expansive: elitism, garbage on the streets, the PPP’s corruption and intractability, politically-linked drug culture, PNC irrationalities, opposition weaknesses, conditions at UG, egregious or criminal behaviour of individuals; his ice cream choices, the “ugly” Berbice bridge, sycophancy in the Republic, Pradoville, the African-Indian divide; the follies of leadership, former President Jagdeo’s power excesses, private sector ‘cowardice’, Cuba and its contradictions, Dr Luncheon’s ambiguous language, Clement Rohee’s performance and public statements, the horrible disparities between rich and poor, his (Kissoon’s) own taste in music, and the new “drug and money laundering” rich and many other targets. Only occasionally does the column digress to international events or some philosophical issue off the shores of Guyana. His criticism exposes not only the dislocations and crimes committed in the society but the lack of response
to them. The nature and frequency in which state officials and PPP pundits take to respond to Kissoon’s column, either directly through official sources or through unofficial sources like the phantom letter writers is a sharp indicator of his effectiveness. Indeed these letters and blogs in the Guyana press are legion. After an earlier tendency to engage these phantom writers, Kissoon’s newest tactic is to ignore them. Political pundits, opposition and government supporters and followers in the diaspora avidly read Kissoon in spite of their social or political position, because at some level they know and have experienced in real time, one aspect or other of Kissoon’s interpretations, reflections, or conclusions. The force of Kissoon’s day-to-day critique of anything to do with the abuse of power, crooked officials and contradictory existence provides a crucial service in a society where traditional means of protest have subsided or dimmed over decades by the rash of immigration, undemocratic practices, broken trade unions, political bribery, corruption and fear. But his other credo is controversy. His courageous exposure of the regime’s character has led to action been taken against him in various forms including open and subtle attacks in print on his character and employment. He has also been the victim of physical assault, and these
Guyanese are mostly about change and voted beyond racial grounds while others refused to do so, resulting in another PPP victory. As such, I do not see that the ruling party will ever be defeated. The end of the PPP/C Government will depend on whenever the majority of my Indo-Guyanese brothers and sisters say enough is enough and put our country first. Rayvonne P. Bourne
It’s time we stop the beating of children in our schools DEAR EDITOR, It is good that the Government has decided to table legislation which would stop the beating of children in Guyana’s schools (Stabroek News 20 June, 2014 “Corporal punishment
Freddie Kissoon and the column... From page 4 for him. The technique he employs, whether strategic, instinctive or reactive, involves short, direct sometimes hyperbolic attacks on organizations, policies, events and individuals. In performing its function, his column incorporates some of the classical attributes of other outstanding columnists: irony, anecdote, mimicry, analogy, comparison, passion, repetition, metaphor, humour and satire. Bolstered by a formidable memory, Kissoon challenges authority at every corner of the political spectrum but retains a high preponderance of his criticism for the current government and party in power since 1992. Correspondingly Kissoon’s column engages a device of identifying friend or colleague on location that has proven extremely effective in bringing his readership closer to the “action.” So for example, Freddie met so and so in Fogartys, on the picket line or court corridors. Irrespective of whether this is a tactic or an instinct written into the writer’s DNA - the identifications of select friends or colleagues in this form in the column serves to place both the recipient and the columnist in the zone of contact from which a kind of situational equality emerges. In a small society accustomed to “who knows who” the naming of associates provides them with the temporary halo of meeting a prominent and controversial columnist in Guyana today. It also defines accessibility to Kissoon and highlights the “local” nature of the discourse in Guyana. Guyana’s capital Georgetown is a small place,
the AFC was formed and contested elections in 2006 under its slogan, “Vote for Change Not Race”, everyone was expecting a turning point in terms of ethnic voting. In the end, however, the AFC got six seats, with the majority of their votes coming from Afro Guyanese communities. The birth of the AFC confirmed the existence of ethnic voting in our society, but also showed that Afro
assaults are not accidental. One strategy employed by Kissoon’s fiercest critics is to place the popular columnist in the category of a mad, crazy writer flailing at everything under the sun. But this depiction of Kissoon fails overall because he employs a sharp intellect, academic discipline, historical perspective, psychology and philosophy to penetrate the veneer of social and political conduct and keenly interprets the irrationalities of Guyanese society like no other. A fact not lost of any section of the society is the fact that Freddie Kissoon is an Indo Guyanese gadfly and iconoclast who reserves the majority of his critique for those political and social forces that unwittingly or strategically, receive their support from the Indian Guyanese electorate or public opinion. In more than one sense his advocacy provides hope to the other sectors and racial groups. In the course of his advocacy and criticism he has offered a bold reassessment of Forbes Burnham and a fearless re-portrayal of Dr Cheddi Jagan, and their respective political roles and legacies. Once what Kissoon frequently terms the “asininities” in Guyana continue, his column (and regular letters) will continue to expose, illuminate and encounter reaction from those fearful of his caustic and roving pen. Nigel Westmaas
dropped from new education bill”). Many persons had thought that the reason Guyana is in a mess is that children were not being beaten in the schools, but this was not true - children get licks in school and at home, like the adults before them who litter, sell liquor to them, drive wildly, play loud music, don’t hold local Government elections, etc. What is true is that many children were no doubt fighting back and refusing to accept what they perceive as injustice, unlike many of us who take licks in its different forms from authority. Previous experiences with progressive legislation in Guyana, especially those which could invoke the wrath of God, have shown that the National Assembly found ways to dump the issues into committees etc. There is a Special Select Committee which has not reported any conclusions on the beating of children issue.
We can only hope that the National Assembly does not convolute itself between the Education Bill and the workings of the committee, and that we will liberate ourselves from this bit of our violent colonial legacy. This time around, the National Assembly has a chance to show that Guyana’s children have the same right to a life free from violence, as the adults who are permitted to beat them. At the same time, the National Assembly should provide resources for the students, teachers and parents - to be able to counter the violence in schools which is intensifying in the same way as in the communities of the schools. One troubled school, for example, had to suspend some of the interactions with the police because there was no space or facilities in the school for all the students to assemble for the duration of the interactions. Vidyaratha Kissoon