Keep name-calling and accusations off letter pages

Oct 20, 2009 Letters

---

Dear Editor
If one Mr. Hemraj Muniram, who supposedly resides in Canada, sent Kaieteur News a letter, similar to the one published by SN touting Kaieteur News columnist Mr. Freddie Kissoon as a book thief about 40 years ago, then I wish to commend Kaieteur News for using sound judgment in refusing to publish it.
If he also sent a similar letter to Chronicle, but the editor did not publish it, then I commend the editor of that newspaper for using solid judgment.
Not that I doubt or debate Mr. Muniram’s vivid recollection of what 56 year-old Mr. Kissoon did at the National Library as a teenager, as many young library members are known book thieves, but I really had to question the judgment and motive of the SN editor in allowing such a vicious personal attack to be published, given that Mr. Kissoon never attacked Mr. Muniram in any of his pieces and given that Mr. Kissoon was processed through the justice system, paid his dues for his mistake, and is today living a reformed life, at least from what we seem to know.
I say from what we seem to know because I have read other letters referring him to ‘Big Coat Kissoon’, implying he also stole books from a store while studying in Canada, but unlike Guyana where even he admitted he was processed, it was never stated that he was caught and processed in Canada, so we are left with only a basic accusation.
Then when I read Mr. Kissoon’s column, “My book theft 39 years ago when I was a 17-year-old rascal,” (Kaieteur News, October 18), explaining his version of what happened with the library books, I couldn’t help shaking my head in disbelief that SN would publish a letter containing with a vicious accusation that would lead to a clarification by the accused that reads more like the kind of stuff people would be talking about in gossip circles. What’s next, another letter from Mr. Muniram defending himself against being labeled a homosexual and making additional accusations against Mr. Kissoon? I am truly dismayed at SN for starting this mudslinging and unless editors take a collective decision to stop it now, they all risk diminishing the value of their letters columns by opening the doors for all sorts of personality-based accusing letters to be published.
Don’t get me wrong, as I am all for free speech, but before I close, let me say, first of all, that while I enjoy reading many of Mr. Kissoon’s enlightening articles, I think he can make just as profound an impact if he can accentuate the issues and not the personalities in the issues.
Yes, there are times when certain public or elected figures become integral to the issues, and it is difficult not to go after the issues without going after them, and there are other times when such persons mess up and are called out on the mess. But excessive engagement in personality-based writings can force critics to respond by focusing on the writer or person, and at a time when we have so many pressing issues in Guyana, we don’t have the time and space for personality bashings in the media.
Second, I think that if SN was going to publish Mr. Muniram’s smear letter it should have at least done so responsibly by publishing an accompanying rebuttal from Mr. Kissoon. No rebuttal should have meant no published letter.
Instead, the SN editor scripted a note at the end of Mr. Muniram’s letter saying Mr. Kissoon did not provide a categorical denial of the direct accusation. How did the editor know that?
According to Mr. Kissoon’s latest column, it turns out the editor had a personal exchange with Mr. Kissoon on the topic, so the editor knows what he knows and chose to pass it on to readers, whereas readers could not make that judgment of Mr. Kissoon for themselves.
The editor inexplicably injected himself into a personal issue and asked us to trust his note and this is what makes the whole issue now seem like the editor of SN wore both his professional and personal hats when deciding to publish Mr. Muniram’s original smear letter.
If the SN editor ever writes a letter clarifying what Mr. Kissoon said about their exchange, it will definitely widen the mess.
I seriously abhor personality-based letters and prefer to deal with issues-based letters, except if the person embodies the issues, and so if Mr. Kissoon wrote a letter or column personally attacking someone, I think it is only fair the person is allowed to reciprocate.
Like I said earlier, I have not read where Mr. Kissoon ever wrote disparagingly about Mr. Muniram.
As a reader who daily peruses the local letters columns, I really don’t want to see the letters column lose their educational and informative standing by being dragged down into a mud fest of unproductive name-callings and accusations that do not lend to intellectual stimulation and learning, and so I hope the editor of SN would learn from his mistake and other editors of newspapers with letters column would also learn from SN’s mistake and not perpetuate it.
Meanwhile, the people who would use Mr. Kissoon’s past mistakes to attack him because of his criticisms of the PPP and Government need to take a look in the mirror and ask how they can attack him for his real or perceived past mistakes, but they are silent given this government is currently awash in criminally corrupt practices with no end in sight.
In the last 17 years, I have not read of any senior government official being arrested, charged and convicted of criminal corruption, and if government believes CANU or customs officers are the only corrupt state employees, it is deceiving only itself.
To Mr. Kissoon, keep writing, even if all readers don’t agree with your opinions.
Emile Mervin

---

---