President Jagdeo was at UG

Jun 19, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I heard on Wednesday morning that Mr. Jagdeo was going to be at UG in the afternoon of the same day to speak to the University community. I immediately rearranged my itinerary for that day. I always wanted to meet with Mr. Jagdeo in front of an audience so we can have an exchange on Guyana, nothing else but our country. That is an inexhaustible agenda.
So I figured I will have space to engage the President on a plethora of his policies in the areas of political economy and political sociology since he became President in 1999. Mr. Jagdeo takes shots at me in a forum in which he dominates – his press conferences.
On one occasion he called me a sleaze ball. So I had all the intention of asking him if he knows any sleaze ball that works closely with him in his administration. On another occasion, he referred to me as a fool.
On hearing that Mr. Jagdeo was coming to speak to us, I telephoned the president of the students’ union to ensure that he has his facts tightly correct before he ventures to question the President. At around noon, the information I earlier received was corrected. Mr. Jagdeo was going to address UG on low carbon strategy – his pet subject. I had to hastily return to my original plan for Wednesday.
I was not interested in low carbon development, and have no intention of being informed about it. Low radio development is a greater priority for me. How can the President of a country face his people and not be ashamed to know that they know his Government keeps Guyana in a state where there is only one radio station in the land and it is owned by the government.
I then reconnected with the students’ union president to let him know that I won’t be there. Many things I wanted to ask the President about, but low carbon development wasn’t one (I have this Freudian fear of carbon – when I was a small boy in Wortmanville at Christmas we used to put carbide in empty cans, spit inside the tin and light it. It went off like a bomb. One day it went the wrong way and almost flew into my face. I was about eight years old then, and I ran home crying. Since then I have no interest in any kind of carbon).
It was commonsensical to know that since the President was speaking on carbon, the floor would not have been allowed to frame questions on non-carbon curiosities. I am sure the meeting would not have accepted that breach of protocol.
So I was exasperatingly disappointed. I thought it would have been one of the most absorbing moments in politics since Mr. Jagdeo became President. There you would have had a large audience and President Jagdeo would have explained why a public servant signed fifty invalid duty free letters but was not disciplined.
Why against that attitude was Joseph O’Lall fired? I would not have missed the opportunity to rally for the cause of more radio stations. To this day, President Jagdeo has never met with any group of Guyanese and offered them his reason for refusing to end the radio monopoly.
It was the Prime Minister, who quietly, aside from the fleet of journalists present, reasoned to a reporter that if there are more radio stations, then we should remember what happened in Rwanda. That was a terrible indictment of the Guyana Government
I would have asked the President, if it was an open floor, how he could have allowed the PM to make reference to Rwanda since Mr. Jagdeo and the PPP Government are very popular, since we have no biting ethnic itch in this nation, and since the PPP Government has come a long way in providing for the people of Guyana.
Why then would we descend to the bad days of genocide in Rwanda by having many radio stations if our nation is so stable and satisfied? I am not sure I would have got in all my questions. I supposed the chairman would have asked me to give others a chance to express their feelings. But I still would have persisted.
I would have tried a question as to why he (the President) continues to withhold the name(s) of the investor(s) of the planned hotel by the Kingston seawall. Oh, definitely, I would have demanded to know what returns the State is getting for putting advertisements in the Guyana Times, Chronicle and Mirror; newspapers that no one buys and therefore given away.
So when would the President face off in a live debate with his critics? I think you know the answer.

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President Jagdeo was at UG

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