Robert Corbin got conned

Aug 26, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

In many ways, you have to show some understanding for the plight of Robert Corbin. This is not to say that he is a better candidate than the two major contestants that fought for the position of leadership – Alexander and Murray (I used the word “major” because Artie Ricknauth did oppose Corbin but he didn’t have the kind of support that Alexander and Murray had). The story of Robert Corbin is the story of the PNC dilemma and Corbin cannot be solely blamed. When other leaders, foremost among them, Vincent Alexander, saw that the dilemma was drowning the PNC, he tried to salvage it; the rest is now history.
The PNC’s headache (not Corbin’s but the PNC’s) began with a PNC’s analysis of the efficacy of “slo fyaah, mo fyaah.” This Macbethian strategy worked under Hoyte, and Hoyte was so enraged at the PPP’s willful destruction of the new administrative culture and the reclamation of the decency in the Westminster system of governance that took place under him, that he was not prepared to extinguish, “mo fyaah, slo fyaah.”
Hoyte’s Macbethian drive was the only option the PNC had to confront a runaway PPP train of bad governance. Convinced that the private sector was being opportunistic, Hoyte refused to listen to voices that were telling him that “mo fyaah, slo fyaah” was hurting Guyana. When told this umpteen times, Hoyte’s perennial response was; “Comrade, this is the only language the PPP understands.”
After Hoyte died, a number of stakeholders saw their chance to douse “mo fyaah, slo fyaah.” Corbin was impressed upon by certain strata of the Guyanese society that “mo fyaah, slo fyaah” was so counter-productive in that it was cementing the relationship with the alienated East Indians and the PPP. But they themselves wanted Macbeth’s witches to be banished because the fire was creating instability.
Corbin agreed to exile Macbeth’s witches, and he led his army into places the PNC never went before. When gunmen killed little Christine Sukhra at Coldingen, Corbin went with the PNC leadership and poured out his heart of empathy. He visited East Indian villages on the low East Coast that were plagued by banditry.
Corbin assumed the title of statesman, Macbeth’s witches were gone, the stakeholders went back to business, and paramountcy of the party took over. By the time Team Alexander realized that the PNC was doing nothing and the PPP had shaped a power tool sharper and deadlier than Burnham’s, it was time to ring the alarm bells. Team Alexander did just that.
The PNC would have been a reborn party if Corbin had agreed to the assessment of Team Alexander that PNC supporters are disenchanted, the African-Guyanese economies were being dismantled and the PNC’s car needed gas. Corbin refused to reassess the direction the PNC had gone into. Corbin was now an official statesman, doing business with the major stakeholders in the Guyanese society.
The point is however, Robert Corbin got conned. Corbin banished his Macbethian creatures but the PPP didn’t send their Leviathans back into the sea The PPP’s Leviathans were multiplying in geometric terms rather than arithmetically
With the PPP out of control, the very stakeholders that beseeched Corbin to extinguish “mo fyaah, slo fyaah” were now reticent over the PPP’s “nuff powaah, nuff monaay.”
Herein lies the dilemma of Robert Corbin. For him, it was a case of the PNC going off the street, and preserving social stability and PNC leaders agreed to that direction.
As the PPP’s runaway train was mashing up the Guyanese terrain, it was Corbin who refused to return to an agenda of opposition confrontation as many PNC stalwarts urged him to. Finally, he had to. The pressure was coming from Team Alexander and others.
So we saw street demonstrations over channel’s six suspension and other forms of protest. But it was too late for Corbin. Rumours of a dialogue with Jagdeo over the third term route made life inside the PNC harder for Corbin.
After the Congress Saturday, he again flexed his muscles and staged a demonstration outside the Office of the President last Monday.
He would have had fond memories of that place. It was right there his career was given a meteoric sweep when the police manhandled him over protest against the 2001 elections.
Shown on television in a wheelchair, Georgetown PNC supporters ran amok. Ronald Waddell furiously told me that the PNC never did that to Cheddi when he was Opposition Leader. Mr. Corbin has returned to the gates of the Presidential Complex but as he looked over his shoulders, he saw that his army was not with him.

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