DEMOCRACY

The elections are over. 

Breathe of fresh air.

Streams forth.

And we breathing at ease.

Then the Order of Roraima.

For some.

The joy disappeared.

They reflected at a terrible time.

While others felt justified..

What happened to endeavours to be the solution?

Perhaps, the gesture of Reconciliation.

Will Truth cometh forth, soon?

Next commentary "GRACE"- Understanding Book of the Ephesians..  

DEMOCRACY.

In Guyana. For me, it should have been a practice of tolerance among those entities that strive to govern us, the citizens. Especially, since there are no dominant ethnic group to give any of the entities a clear majority.  We should have been a model nation to the world, because we are the descendants of a people who were brought to these lands as slaves and bonded males and females.

In our earlier existence on this land, our forefathers were very cooperative with each other-regardless of ethnicities.  We have learnt from each other in many ways.

Tolerance and trust should have been our mainstay. Political parties should have had government subsidies to carry out their work.  And equal freedom and finances to promote their agenda. For it is the people that will be served.

Instead of the desire to have opponents at a disadvantage to have the upper edge. To spread propaganda. And to deceive the citizens.

Such things erodes the trust among the upper echelon of the society. It breathes contempt. Such ill feelings do no good for the people of the country. It weakens us.

A Constitution is the framework of democracy.

Yet, no political leader never found the decency to correct the one written for this nation by devious men in our past history. Today, it saddles the country with poor governance and empowers individuals of poor character to hold high offices in this land – untouched by the laws of the country. They have awarded immunity onto themselves. There is no none in charge. Such men and women are answerable to no one. They are a power on to themselves. Dangerous to the wellbeing of the citizens. Those are the types of political organizations we have –the PPP, the PNC, and the AFC. There is no discipline in their structures or perhaps the political parties have no desires to challenge an inept President or corrupt Ministers or an inadequate one holding a Ministerial position.

We have seen what the PNC had done with the Constitution written by them-for their favours. And with the same Constitution, today we are experiencing terrible governance under the PPP. Political Parties- equally deficient of moral values to question and challenge. Also, is the AFC, for it shows they too can be contemptuous; perhaps, it could be their Stalinist’s indoctrination. For Josef Stalin was a revered Soviet leader admired by both Forbes and Cheddie and their protégé.

The electorate alienation into the camps of Afro and Indo started with 1950’s politics. That pattern will continue on in our future unless something drastic is done to promote trust and willingness to listen to others rather than ones ethnic group. 

What has made the Indo-Guyanese distrustful of the People’s National Congress?  Is it the Split of 1955 whereby the Peoples Progressive Party became factions of Burnhamites and Jaganites? Could that have been perceived as racism because the Indoes choose Cheddie and Afroes choose Forbes. Or, is it as the Afro-Guyanese intellectuals claim that such hatred lies in the teachings of Hinduism? It is true Hinduism endorses and enforces a caste system in India. However in Guyana, that brand of Hinduism does not exists. For the Indoes who discriminate against Afroes for no reason at all, then it must be an inward trait to exercise dominance over another group of people in a society. Could the possibility exists that the Wismar Massacre is responsible for the racial divisions in the country? That incident could have made any rational Indian into a racist. And it did affect many doctors who tended to the female victims. Unspeakable horrific things done to the sexuality of the young and old. They were ferried out of Wismar/Linden, the young and old, men and women –all wounded in some way and laid bare on the wharves in Georgetown. The dead –their soul departed in fear and desperation.

Years later, in foreign countries, Lindeners would retell of that day. They said there was moaning and groaning coming from the victims as they laid in drains and parapits. Also, they were quick to point out that it wasn’t Lindeners who did those horrible acts. Claiming, “The rampaging mob was sent from Georgetown-ferried in on the Son Chapman.”

At that era of our history, there were only two men in the People’s National Congress who could have ordered and enraged such a mob. The hour long ferry trip from Georgetown did not quell their enraged spirits-riled up by speeches of hate in Georgetown. The mob hit the docks at Wismar/Linden in a frenzied state. Raw hate.

The Jews say that God is always speaking, because He expects the discernment He had placed in the hearts of mankind would hear His words in the thoughts of their minds. But that day in Wismar/Linden, Lucifer and his demons was in full force-tribalism of hate spurned on by the beat of drums-silently in the heads of the mob. Fire. The domain of the devil brought down to Wismar. What was the reward of the devil to Lindeners for the carnage; the devil is known for getting humans to cheat, steal, rob and kill. The gains of the mob were only temporary-the loot was spent in no time, the gold was smelted, what sexual pleasure could be had from the rape of women and the lives snuffed out, surely The Almighty will enquire from the murderers.

It has been fifty years since. Perhaps, some of the victims dead. Perhaps, some of the mob dead. Perhaps, one of the architects of that massacre still alive in the enclave of the People’s National Congress.  The Peoples Progressive Party blamed the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States of America for the massacre. True to their Soviet masters, the tragedy became just another Cold War escapade of blaming the Americans. The British were blamed for dividing the races-with their motto, “Divide and Rule.” And the devil’s reward to Lindeners! I leave that for the people of Linden to take stock of their fortunes over the last fifty years. 

It is said, “The public has a short memory.” And those incidents were forgotten. The leadership of People’s Progressive Party gave Critical Support to the People’s National Congress on many issues and even considered Shared Governance.

So why, the distrust of the People’s National Congress still prevails onto this day? There are feelings that East Indians were marginalized-teaching jobs were denied and the civil services jobs too.

A PNC party card was essential for any kind of activity.  

No country remains the same-British Guiana/Guyana was a country in transition. Before the arrivals of Portuguese, Chinese and East Indians, there were only the Amerindians, Whites, Africans and the admixture of those races. Education of Africans was a negotiated agreement at the Emancipation Declarations. Church ran schools continually educated African children even before the Indenture-ship period was implemented in the colony. And when Indentures came, the Church ran schools were still educating African children and continued until the People’s Progressive Party decision to rid the colony of the Church participation in education. It was only natural for those educated Africans to hold every position/job in the colony. And when the time came for the children of the Indentured to be educated, it was the African who taught the Portuguese, the Chinese, the Amerindians and the East Indians. As the way progress goes, eventually there were more people and of different races competing for the same jobs. The African started to lose ground-the Portuguese honed in on their commercial and farming ventures. About a century later, the PPP challenged the Church ran schools of forcing East Indians to become Christians in order to get a teaching job in their schools. The church was out of education. And the PPP rewarded PYO members with teaching jobs throughout the colony-even if they were poorly qualified. By the time the PNC assumed the government, Afro-Guyanese youths were underemployed. There was a genuine need to address the problem-opportunities were made available to them. Besides the population was increasing and not enough jobs were around.

Another complaint against the People’s National Congress. The banning of food items. Both Afroes and Indoes complained, each with different reasons. For the Indoes, it is the food lines they cannot get out of their minds and the abuses that took place. To stand all day, get to the counter and to be told the supplies were finished when there were supplies clearly visible. That was Prejudice. Heaven knows what other demands were made for special favours from mothers to get a little bit of food to feed their families. The Indoes craved for dhal, potatoes and wheat flour-they complained about not having flour to make puri for their weddings. With the banning of food items, a contraband culture evolved-ran mainly by East Indians. Many became very wealthy from it. The Police and Army deployed to apprehend Contraband Brigades. The Disciplined Forces did many things with items seized, but what they did with wheaten flour remained indelible in the minds of Afro-Guyanese. Bread, somehow has significance in Christianity. And the sized flour was poured out of the sacks on the ground and kicked around. Left over bread was never cast aside, it was soaked into water. In the Caribbean, Guyanese became laughing stock, for some would purchase bread as one would of Duty Free items when travelling abroad.

The People’s National Congress made us look foolish in the eyes of our Caribbean brothers. Today, the People’s Progressive Party does the same with their corrupt practices, forcing citizens to take refuge among those who have lost respect for Guyanese.          

The decision to ban food items wiped out the merchants of the Colonial Era. Yes, today there are plenty of food on the shelves. But not every commodity is for everyone or can be purchased by everyone. If were not for families living abroad many at home could not even afforded the items. But Indoes would remark, “We have food now, the PPP give us food again.”

There are times, politician decree but God turns whatever might have been meant to be bad into good - undo harm. East Indians may have viewed the decisions by L.F.S Burnham as a personal attack on them. Certainly, the Jagans gave the impression it was a personal attack. I think it was more of an attack on the support base of the People’s Progressive Party who happened to be predominantly East Indians. The international decision to keep the PPP out of government due to its Soviet leanings eventually made East Indians into second class citizens in Guyana.  One was either a PPPite or PNCite and a card carrying member.

And East Indians found whichever way to SURVIVE under the decrees of the People’s National Congress.

Many would go to United States of America. The country despised by the People’s Progressive Party, labelled with despicable names. A country that denied equal opportunities to African Americans, yet supports Afro-Guyanese in the suppression of East Indians.

Strange country, this America. Backing suppression of East Indians in Guyana and yet open its doors to them for immigration. And they arrived in large numbers. Parents did whatever they could to get their girl children out of Guyana and into America. There were cases where East Indian young men took advantage of the situation. Many were feted with the false promises of marriage. Some young men even went through the marriages, consummated the marriages but never filed Immigration Papers for their wives. For some young men, this was a regular practice when they made returned visits to Guyana.

Everyone wanted to leave Guyana.

The Portuguese cited their European heritage and the doors were open to them in America, Britain and Canada.

For the Guyanese of African and East Indian decent, it was a struggle to access any type of visa. They religiously tracked every Immigration Policy decision in Canada and the United States with the hope of being able to put in an application for a visa-Permanent or Visitors.   

An entrepreneurial class emerged to meet demands of many of the shortages of commodities the Burnham decrees had imposed. It gave rise to what is referred to as the ‘SUITCASE ECONOMY’. East Indian seamstresses began by sewing clothes, travelled to Caribbean Islands and sold their products. Returning to Guyana with filled suitcases of commodities to meet the demands of the people.

Selling out of suitcases was nothing new for the East Indians in Guyana. Some did that trade in the Negro villages for decades. The conditions imposed by the Burnham decrees simply pushed them beyond the borders of Guyana. The Caribbean Islands became the market place. And the once few became many, operating out of suitcases, traversing the Islands and Guyana.

TRADERS became their name. And it was no longer only East Indians. Many Negro women became involved in the trade. At Timehri Airport, an observant traveller could see the cooperation of these women-Indoes and Afroes.  The decrees of Burnham affected the Afro-Guyanese as well.

As Guyanese continue to immigrate to Canada and the United States, they sought ways of helping family and friends in need. It appeared as if everyone in Guyana needed some sort of assistance. To fill that need, the opportunity of a booming transportation business materialized. BARRELS filled with much needed commodities were shipped to Guyana continuously. That venture made several entrepreneurs very wealthy.

REMITTANCES eventually became a significant component of the Guyanese economy. Millions of dollars sent by Guyanese living in Canada, United States and other parts of the world created a consumer class in Guyanese. And that gave rise to RETAIL BUSINESSESS. The new trend of SUPERMARKETS.

The lives of the people were comfortable again as in the Colonial Period. And the People’s Progressive Party saw the consumerism as part of their program of success. Failing to build on the generosity of the diaspora. And the PPP became complacent.

Why did the American government focused on British Guiana in 1953?

America in the 1930’s had a following of men and women who were Communists.  Rampant poverty, the lack of having a meal and providing for families was an everyday occurrence.  And elites with the Communist agenda saw the deprivations as an opportunity in promoting the ideology. Trade Unions were infiltrated. Democracy was under attack in America. And the Pro-Democracy champions were people of tremendous influences.

There were crack downs.

At the time, Cheddie Jagan was a student in America. It is written, he was introduced to Communist ideology by a young woman he was seeing at the time. Stopped stone cold in America. They would wait for years, returning to British Guiana to pursue their desires upon an unsuspecting impoverished people.

And they came to British Guiana as a married couple.

Immediately, the norms of an influential colonial people were challenged-the Negroes, the East Indians, the Chinese, the Portuguese, the Mixed People. Termed colonial stooges.

There, began the struggles of extremists and moderates in the Guyanese society. Every opportunity was an assault on the sugar industry- the major employer in the colony. Obviously, to control the workers by a Trade Union. Even though one already existed.

Typical of the Communist, lies and deception became their tools.  And the poor began to look at their White employers with suspicions. The Bible states; “Words are a spirit and life.” And the words of the People’s Progressive Party has cursed the country.  After twenty eight years in Opposition, they returned to power to fulfill the curses. Today, after their rule of twenty two years, what has become of the country? Crimes and criminals are unchecked. Law and Order disregarded by government officials and elite citizenry. The Justice System rift with unethical practices. Narcotics and its shipment destroyed the legitimate exporting of local products. The Environment is foul with garbage. The Drainage and Irrigation System in derelict conditions. Cronyism nurtured poor infra-structures of the country. And their sins are responsible for those in despair who take their own lives-just to escape the hardships imposed by the People’s Progressive Party.  

They are simply a VERY BAD group of men and women in the PPP.  

The People’s Progressive Party is void of leadership-it has a lot of devious people in its midst. So, there is no one in authority. BECAUSE, each knows the wretched ways of the other.

The People’s Progressive Party lacked the ethics of governing. And not today, but in fact since 1953.

Why would the British Government suspend the 1953 Constitution? Because the leadership of the PPP had no respect for the laws written in it.

They gained the confidence of the poor by telling them that the British were paying slave wages and do nothing to ease their misery. When in actual fact, the Sugar Welfare Fund was moving people out of the Cottages into Housing Schemes. There it was, a White person telling an entire Indo group of Guyanese that another set of White people were causing the misery in their lives. And they believed.   

The plan of the People’s Progressive Party was to rid the colony of the Brits and hand its administrations over to the Soviets. How they ever hoped to achieve that-only the Almighty would know. The PPP leadership had to be naive as to what the Americans and British would do to prevent such an event from happening. There had to be something wrong to even think up a plan like that.  Especially, since the Cubans entertained the Soviets in their country. Guatemala was in turmoil-orchestrated by the Central Intelligence Agency. Arbenz had to flee to Mexico. Allende in Chile was monitored by the Americans. And Mousadeh of Iran was ousted.

What was the leadership of PPP thinking when they sent the photograph of Josef Stalin to PPP cells in the villages? Grown men hung the huge photograph of Stalin around their necks and paraded themselves in the presence of the Governor of the Colony-as a form of protest. Less than ten years had passed since Josef Stalin sat with Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman as an axis for defeating Adolph Hitler.  Western nations witnessed the maneuvers of the Soviets as they raced to occupy Germany. In the end, occupying East Germany.  The world watched as the Soviets dominated the lives of the Eastern Europeans.

Who in their right mind would think that the PPP would have been allowed to hand Guyana over to the Soviets?

Just as a today, the PPP of 1953 abandoned their Ministerial duties in pursuit of another agenda. The Legislature descended into upheaval – chaos. Diplomacy and respect for Higher Authority trampled, replaced by anger and plain stubbornness. A line dawn in the Guyanese society, either one was a PPP or a Colonial Stooge. The situation became as historians compare the civilizations of the Greeks and Romans. The Greeks, cultured and diplomatic. The Romans, barbaric and uncouth.

The PPP was never an organization of calmness – always confrontational. Just as today, propaganda was their stock and trade. Justice, diplomacy, good reasoning and decency escaped and escapes their minds. A barbaric group of individuals.  For those of a cultured disposition, the path to Independence was going to be one of observing all the protocols of a matured society capable of being Independent.  Such a path was to be scorned by the People’s Progressive Party-their objections simply dismissed as, “Colonial Stooges.”

With charged rhetoric coming from the People’s Progressive Party, a concerned Governor of the Colony called in the Premier for dialogue. The Governor disclosed, “It appears the Premier is not thinking on his own-someone else is directing his decisions.”

Who is directing Donald Ramotar?

PROROGUE of parliament is to empower a group of individuals who do not have to answer for their actions. The PPP tried the same things in 1953-to do whatever they wanted. But there was a Higher Power then to curb their excessive behaviour. The Constitution was suspended.

Until the Governor read the reasons for the Suspension Order on the radio. Rural peoples never knew the leadership of the PPP made several trips to the Soviet block for indoctrinations. They transported and disseminate subversive literature throughout the colony. Encouraged sabotage and civil disorder.  

 Unfortunate for the citizens. In the rural areas, the voice of the Colonials was drown out by the PPP. Their message to the Indoes, “We Care.” Similar to the present day, “We Care.”

Back in the fifties, the “We Care” was to empower the PPP whose deceitful plan was to take the people into the Soviet sphere.

Today’s, “We Care” is to empower the PPP to continue their reckless administration of the country-disrespect for parliament, corruption, cronyism and list could go on and on.

Those “We Care” had and has a price. Jim Jones cared too. And his followers committed mass suicide.

I ask the voters who willingly give their votes to the PPP. Do you see the pattern of despair and suicides in the rural areas-your communities?

Do you really believe that the People’s Progressive Party cares?      

STUBBORNNESS-a natural trait of the leadership of the People’s Progressive Party. Unwilling to change ideology. Unwilling to provide good governance. Unwilling to call Local Government Elections. Unwilling to call General Elections. Unwilling to replace corrupt ministers. Unwilling to re-convene parliament in a timely manner. Unwilling to lift the prorogue decree.

Stubbornness.

East Indians must understand why the People’s Progressive Party has to go. If East Indians are part of the PPP stubbornness, then what will emerge as the Alternative? There is no Linden Forbes Samson Burnham this time around. He was the lesser of two evils imposed by the British. For we are truly witnessing an evil and corrupt People’s Progressive Party. The British cannot choose for us anymore. It is Guyanese who will have to determine the Change.     

The PPP have boasted of not ever lost an election. But this time around, they could. That depends entirely on the People’s National Congress, Mr. Granger and Mr. Nagamoottoo. Each, separately must weigh their choices. Either to seek personal ambitions or place Guyana foremost.

Sincerely,

Velutha Kuttapen.

timehri@golden.net

www.timehritoday.blogspot.com