At what stage do we confront a dictatorship?

Sep 18, 2008 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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In Tuesday’s Peeping Tom, a number of accusations were made against my political activism. Even if one person believes the fictionalization in that assessment, such a person ought to know the facts.

The facts can help that person rid himself of the nasty propaganda that so many innocent persons have fallen for and in the process gave crucial support to this government.

Peeping Tom wrote of me the following: “He clearly feels betrayed by the PPP because they did not dump someone that he does not favour at UG…but why has he lost all focus in his analysis simply because the government appointed someone at UG for whom he obviously has a tremendous dislike?”

That statement is based on deliberate and dastardly distortions of the true situation which tells the story of forms of authoritarian excesses of this present Government that the Burnham Government would not have contemplated.

There are several dangerous flaws in that Tuesday article that I want to dwell on so I will be brief on UG since most, if not all the major stakeholders in Guyana, know what happened at UG. It was not the person as Peeping Tom assumed. It as the form the appointment took.

It was the way the Government tossed aside every inch of political and administrative decency and bullied the University community on three identical occasions.

It was the use of power on three occasions over one particular issue that I believe Mr. Burnham would never have done.

I say from the bosom of my heart, the third occasion of that appointment (again I stress it is not the person involved) has shown me most clearly that this government has no redemptive features and is going to cause major harm to this country.

Let us move on to the weaker sections of Tuesday’s Peeping Tom. The writer claims I have contradicted myself in stating that Hoyte did magnificent things yet I criticized him unto the day he died.

The distinction was not made between Hoyte as President and Hoyte as Opposition leader by Peeping Tom. As President, Hoyte did magnificent things. He tried to break away from the race syndrome.

He showed impatience at corruption; he attempted to depoliticize the public sector; he moved away from party paramountcy; he avoided family incestuousness in state jobs.

These malignant political traits have returned. Corruption is welcomed in the corridors of power. As Opposition Leader, Hoyte made some bad judgements like going to the Square of the Revolution to visit the coffin of Linden “Blackie” London.

He was, however, not all that unsuccessful as Opposition Leader. His strategy of “mo fyaah/slow fyaah” slowed down the authoritarian train.

If Hoyte were alive today, I doubt whether the PNC would have been as inactive as it is now. I couldn’t see Hoyte supporting Mr. Jagdeo’s consultations on the EPA against all the failed requests to the President by the PNC as we see now.

Hoyte knew the nature of the PPP because Mr. Burnham probably gave him volumes and volumes of lectures. Mr. Hoyte told one of Guyana’s well known and respected expatriates that the PPP will only talk at the table once there is confrontation in the political arena.

We have had an ineffective opposition, including the non-PNC groups, and look at what has emerged. Professor Clive Thomas calls it the “Criminalized State”. I refer to it as “Elected Dictatorship”. Let’s quote Peeping Tom again: “There are a great many bad things happening in Guyana.”

Whichever Peeping Tom wrote that line had penned that observation years ago. I have read that intonement from probably this Peeping Tom countless times. But what has our awareness of this decline done to save Guyana?

Since this Peeping Tom and others have conceded that bad things are being perpetrated by the government on this nation, the authoritarian train has gone out of control.

The list makes sad reading. The victims come from all classes in society, from all types of organizations including PPP members themselves.

It was Joseph O’Lall, then chairman of the PPP Georgetown district committee, who told me while he was alive, and while he was preparing for the August congress of the PPP, that President Jagdeo dismissed him without giving him a hearing. He told me that I was free to quote him.

He cited PM Hinds as a witness to the President’s refusal to allow him to speak. This writer called the PM for confirmation and he declined to contradict O’Lall’s testimony.

So at what stage do we raise our voices and say that these bad things should stop? Or am I going to read two years from now, this same Peeping Tom writing the following line: “Bad things are happening.”

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