A Stepfather to the nation

Mar 07, 2009 Letters

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Dear Editor,
Julianne Gaul in his letter dated 26-02-2009 in the Kaieteur News said that Burnham is the father of the nation. She said that Burnham brought Independence to Guyana and he built the President’s College. If we are to judge people as great for doing so little then we will say people like Somoza, Pinochet, and Eric Gairy are also fathers of their nations.
Burnham did not fight for independence when he formed the PNC, but fought against it. Independence was given to him because he helped to get rid of the PPP from government. After a time he became a liability to the people who put him into power.

His free-education policy became a nightmare to the Guyanese people, and building President’s College was not something that would have brought an end to the educational crisis in the country. He died and the college was not finished. It was completed under Hoyte but it encountered the same problem like other public schools. When the PPP took over government it had to focus on the whole educational system of the country, renovating and building new schools and opening more teacher-training centres. The education system like other sectors was a complete failure under the PNC.

The few East Indians who were Ministers and held high offices were just rubber stamps. Vincent Teekah, who was Minister of Education, could not make a decision without consulting Burnham.
He had granted a scholarship to someone at the University to do his doctorate but he had to take the guy to see Burnham personally. Burnham agreed to the scholarship, but the person had to put his house up as security. How many of Burnham supporters had to pledge their property to go on a scholarship? That guy came back and is still working in the country, while many of them who were PNC supporters and who did not put up any security never returned to Guyana.

He set the Indian against the African, union against union, party against party, and even in his own party he set Reid against Green.
Can someone tell the
Guyanese people which system under the PNC was a success?
One writer said that Burnham built two hundred miles of road. No one denies that fact. All governments in the world build roads and bridges for their countries, but was it these few things that makes him the father of the nation?

A father helps to build his children with love. He doesn’t live only for himself and think less of his children by denying them what are theirs and force them to leave his house. He does not set one against the other. This is what Burnham did.
In July 1967 a PNC supporter writing in the Sunday Graphic under the name Lucian said that many Guyanese and non-Guyanese were disgusted with the present state of affairs in this country. Some were packing up to leave out of sheer frustration, while others were dejected from unbearable disgust. These included skilled, semi-skilled and white-collar workers and professionals.

Burnham used race and sold his soul to the devil to achieve his end. When he became the leader of the country he fired many people who were against him and denied jobs to those who did not support him. Supporters of the other parties could not find jobs in the police force and the army. He put his own supporters in the public service, and unqualified people were put in the education system. Promotion was given to those who supported the PNC, thus causing the downfall of the education and the public service systems. One Prime Minister said that his staff could not do simple arithmetic.

Which father in this world would want to see his children go hungry? Only one “father”, and that is Burnham.
When the economy was in shambles and could not import food items, he fooled Guyanese saying that “we have to change our taste, we have to eat the local things that we produce”. The local products were not enough, causing the prices to increase where the ordinary people could not afford to buy them. Burnham told the people that they were not producing enough so he introduced daylight saving time. This did not help either, because with only the basic tools no one can produce.  The General Secretary of the TUC Joseph Pollydore had to declare that our children went to school in the mornings just with one cup of sugar water.

Land was taken away from the real producers and given to those who cannot produce. New lands were given to the PNC supporters who sublet them because they did not know anything about agriculture.
Over six hundred million dollars collected from the sugar industry as levies vanished into thin air, and the workers who toiled to make it were not given any of it. The Sugar Industry Labor Welfare Fund Committee which was supposed to look out for the development of the sugar workers was used to develop the non-sugar-producing areas.
No new sugar estate housing areas were developed and, when the workers squatted on the vacant land that was supposed to be given to them, they were evacuated by the military and all their belongings taken away. In one instance a minister who was there at the time slapped one of the workers when he spoke out against things.

Many people lost their lives just because they expressed their frustration. Some were charged without doing anything wrong. Dr. Ramsammy was shot and no one was charged, and Rodney was killed and everyone knows who was responsible for it.
Burnham’s close friend was the Rabbi Washington, and everyone knows what he did. He was like James Bond – he had a licence to kill.
To live like a king Burnham destroyed a nation, made a once prosperous country a begging bowl, and its people miserable.
The autocracy that Burnham caused upon the Guyanese people is countless, so he cannot be the father of the nation, maybe the stepfather.
Jagessar Sukhraj

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