I hope Kurshid Sattaur is watching

Sep 25, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Mr. Khurshid Sattuar, head of the Guyana Revenue Authority, should take a long, reflective look at what happened to Mr. Doodnauth Singh. Mr. Sattaur has taken on the role of witch-hunter for his political bosses, the same political hierarchy that is seeking to hassle Doodnauth Singh.
Mr. Sattaur has been writing people asking them if they ever gave me money. He has left thousands of persons who default on their taxes to pursue someone like me, a mere public sector worker without any conceivable wealth.
He has even failed to investigate the $60 million home purchase by a mere Accounts Clerk, who was an employee of Guyoil.
One hopes that Mr. Sattaur knows a little about history. He should, now that he sees what has happened to Doodnauth Singh
We will get back to Khurshid Sattaur in forthcoming columns but for now, Sattaur should ask himself what went wrong with Singh and the Government. I will answer that question for him right now.
Singh may have disagreed with the little dictators and now they are trying to get back at him. Just one disagreement on a matter of principle and the knives came out. One day Sattaur will find himself facing the Singh dilemma. It is a syndrome that will visit all those like Sattaur who chose to become oppressors.
Guyanese woke up to have their breakfast and saw on the front page of the Kaieteur News, a huge photograph of Doodnauth Singh with the claim that he has taken the Government to court over his gratuity.
I was shocked when I saw it. I hadn’t known about it because I wasn’t at Kaieteur News for a few days. I smiled when I saw the headline. I smiled because I have had the last laugh. I smiled because it was just the day before that I wrote in my column of the serpent coming back to bite those who ignore the lessons of history.
Doodnauth Singh cannot deny that I warned him against taking up an appointment as the Attorney General with the PPP Government. I wrote about this before and I will repeat it. We met outside the courtroom of then High Court Judge, Justice Mr. Winston Moore. We had a long chat.
I presented my case for the ultimate failure of the Jagdeo Government because so many values important to the nurturing and continuation of freedom, justice, rights and democracy for which the PPP has no regards, and will never have, are not seen as sacred principles of life.
Doodnauth spoke to me as a person who knew his country’s politics. I was speechless when months later, I read that he had become the Attorney General. I knew that it would lead to loss of credibility.
I grew up in politics watching Doodnauth Singh fight for human rights under the reign of the Forbes Burnham Government. I came to respect people like him. I saw his legal learning during the Arnold Rampersaud trial when I sat in the courtroom everyday.
In many articles on this page since he became the AG, I asked how he felt that the very things he fought against in the eighties are being practiced by a government of which he was one of the fulcrums.
When he celebrated his 50th year as a legal practitioner at the Georgetown Club, my column for that day was a critical reflection of his politics. He was annoyed at the article because he voiced his anger to at least two persons who spoke to me about it. Both of them agreed that the essay was not venomous.
Again, I took issue with him over his office’s petition to the High Court to overturn a Magistrate’s decision to grant Oliver Hinckson bail. I hope he gets his money because he needs it for his medical bills. I hope one day we run into each other.
Sasenarine Kowlessar and I were good friends during our UG student days, and our friendship continued when we both became lecturers at our Alma Mater.
When he was Minister of Finance, I met him in Kitty and asked him for his cell phone number. He declined. This was a good friend of mine who had now become a political powerhouse. I was a nobody, one not worthy of having Sase’s phone number.
Sase has returned to teaching at UG where I hold a more senior position. He is no longer a Minister but I am the same Freddie Kissoon. One day in the future I will meet Doodnauth and Khurshid Sattaur and they will be without their power (Doodnauth is no longer a Minister as you can see) and I will be the same Freddie Kissoon.
I am a nobody without power but I will pass those who lost their power while I will always be who I am – a caring nobody.

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