Michael Jackson and Bharrat Jagdeo: The tragedy of power

Sep 29, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

The future of Guyana was the subject of an intense conversation on Sunday evening with the core of the debate being the third term scenario for Mr. Jagdeo. I was the only participant who stuck to my present belief that Mr. Jagdeo will be the PPP’s presidential nominee for 2011 or whenever is the election. I reproduced one of my columns in my defence and I will do it here again. It is based on my understanding of how dictators operate.

All the persons in that chat took the position that Mr. Jagdeo will not risk such a route. It is pregnant with trouble. But this is in fact the weakness in their theorising.

We, the ordinary people, cannot understand and will have an onerous time trying to comprehend what goes on in the mind of powerful people who think that they are great.

Thankfully, more and more information is coming out from people very close to Michael Jackson that will help us to understand the psyche of powerful people.

In the latest book on Jackson, his spiritual counselor, Rabbi Boteach, confessed in an NBC interview that he had to give up on Jackson because he wasn’t listening to him anymore and after a while Jackson made him feel he wasn’t needed anymore. This was the same sentiment expressed by Jackson’s long time buddy, Uri Geller.

After a while insults crept in. Both Boteach and Geller felt it was time to part with Jackson. I know that feeling. I once wrote a consultancy paper for one of Guyana’s leading businessmen. After reading it, he told me, “Freddie, it is my company, I know how to run it.”

The Achilles’ heel of powerful people is that they do not see reality the way we do. They are not on the same reality plane as we are. We can see a workable side to reality that they cannot. This has been the downfall of hundreds of powerful leaders throughout history.

I am convinced that Burnham’s style scared away those who wanted to steer him in a more democratic path.

One day, after Mr. Jagdeo leaves the presidency, I will reveal the names of two close friends of Jagdeo who told me that he doesn’t listen. I may not be able to identify one of them for a long, long time to come. The other I may be able to do so shortly after Mr. Jagdeo rides away in the evening sun.

I have known both of these persons, many moons before Mr. Jagdeo ever saw the doorsteps of Freedom House. My point is that we, the ordinary people, see trouble ahead if Jagdeo tampers with the third-term restriction. But does Mr. Jagdeo see it the way we do? The answer is a reverberating no.

Mr. Jagdeo is like Forbes Burnham. The latter was in a mental state that made him feel he could rule Guyana the way he wanted to. There is that identical conceptualisation of Mr. Jagdeo.

Mr. Jagdeo has surpassed Forbes Burnham in unrestricted latitude. President Forbes Burnham was a harassed leader worn down by a plethora of opposition activists from political parties to academics through to trade unionists to church officials, right down to civil society.

In Guyana, Mr. Jagdeo’s excesses have made Forbes Burnham look like Nelson Mandela. What Guyanese are witnessing right before their eyes is the historical obliteration of Mr. Burnham’s sins, thanks to the authoritarian extremism of Bharrat Jagdeo.

It is simply an act of absurdity to walk onto a stage and begin to enumerate the faults of Burnham and then say, “This was a terrible dictatorship.”

People are going to throw stink eggs on you. Burnham’s faults have been buried in the sands of time by a young dictator named Bharrat Jagdeo. Whenever the comparison is made, Mr. Jagdeo will come out as the more dictatorial. Sad and tragic that is, but it is history at work. The story of a bad president by the name of Forbes Burnham has vanished into thin air.

The historians, analysts and commentators have now shifted focus to Jagdeo. No one knows what will happen if there is a referendum or tampering with Parliament to remove term limits in the Constitution. But my insistence is that Mr. Jagdeo will get the PPP’s nomination.

At his last press conference, Mr. Jagdeo refused to answer the question as to whether he favours the removal of term limits. It was a good question from an independent journalist. In conclusion then, we the citizens may see danger around the corner. Mr. Jagdeo doesn’t. But then, he is not an ordinary citizen.

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Michael Jackson and Bharrat Jagdeo: The tragedy of power

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