How different is this from the Burnham era?

Oct 22, 2009 Letters

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Dear Editor,
I respond to my friend Mr. Ravi Dev’s column, “For Malcolm,” (Kaieteur News 10-18-09). Let me respectfully say to Ravi that I served him and ROAR with the same zeal and enthusiasm with which I had earlier served Dr Jagan and the PPP and just as I have questioned the governance of the PPP regime so too must I now question Ravi and hopefully still remain a friend.
I gather from the first half of his article that due to “the dissolution of ROAR” Ravi is no longer in active politics and has withdrawn to the sidelines to offer his “version of a substantive democracy appropriate to our nation, rather than cussing out anyone.”
I thank him for defining his new role and I shall comment on this.
I wish to further comment on President Hoyte’s holding of free and fair elections in 1992, Ravi’s position that a PPP government in the 1980’s could not have established a communist state in Guyana, and to tie all of this in with the utterances of premier Hindu Pandit Reepu Daman Persaud who on 10-17-09 at the Diwali celebrations publicly urged Hindus to give President Jagdeo a third term in office.
Firstly I am a bit taken back that now that Ravi is retired from active politics he now views opposition criticism of the PPP regime as “cussing out.” It means then that when he was active that he also “cussed out,” and by extension members of ROAR also “cussed out.”
Well I regret to say that I never saw myself as “cussing out” the PPP, but led by you we were all offering very valid criticisms of the regime.
I would venture to say that ROAR’s analysis and proposals, of which you were the principal intellectual architect, were quite correct. Since then the political and social situation has worsened geometrically with the empowerment of prison escapees and narco militias that saw killings and counter killings of Indians and Africans.
So how come in today”s worsening conditions similar criticisms are deemed “cussing out?”
Ravi’s shift from ROAR’s position to that of Gramsci and Foucault’s is now strangely, perhaps conveniently, causing him to be less intellectually rigorous in explaining the era of the Hoyte Presidency and the PPP ’s power sharing deal with Burnham.
By August 1985 the PPP and PNC had concluded a deal to establish a one party communist state via contesting the December 85 elections on a joint slate.
Unfortunately for the PPP Burnham died and his successor Hoyte said, “Enough of this Socialist nonsense,” and rendered the Burnham/Jagan deal null and void.
At that time elections were due in four months. Hoyte held the elections with the same machinery and list that would have been used by Burnham and Jagan.
Hoyte got the same 85% support as Burnham and Jagan would have declared for them selves, thus shutting out the WPA, DLM, and UF. Soon after, Hoyte met with the Caribbean leaders in Mustique where he agreed to return to substantive and procedural democracy.
It was not until after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War in 1990 that the US politicians started to pressure the PNC about elections.
It must be appreciated that Hoyte had to combat the Burnhamists such as Hamilton Green in starting the slow return to substantive democracy.
It was the Burnhamists who fomented social unrest on election day in 92 and it was Hoyte who ordered the Police Commissioner to quell the riots.
At this point I want to compare the Hoyte approach with the PPP/Jagan’s approach to substantive democracy. Hoyte had tried and jailed PNC thug Rabbi Washington for murder. Ms Jagan used her influence to have Washington released via parole. Which other convicted murderer was ever paroled anywhere else in the world? She stated that he was misused by Burnham. Hoyte had tried African drug baron Errol Butcher aka Taps and jailed him. Ms Jagan intervened to give him an early appeal and he was freed. The word from her “ideological children” was that he would help the PPP mobilize South Georgetown. Taps held a huge party in Albouystown where he publicly praised “granny” for setting him free.
In fact both of those Burnham hoodlums were freed before the four GDF/Police Officers charged with plotting to overthrow the PNC were released from prison. The WPA’s Karen D’Souza and a few women were baton charged outside parliament by the police. Those acts of subterfuge were ominous signs of how the PPP were to govern.
The pure Marxist Lenninist Party, the Vanguard Party, the Bolsheviks, the historical party had at last come to power and it soon set about undoing Hoyte’s dismantling of party paramountcy by heading the public sector with PPP personnel. It seized control of all state media. It continuously denied radio licences to independent operators. It closed down independent TV stations. It constantly attacked the independent media. The parliament became more of a rubber stamp and a circus. Ethnic fears were exacerbated and exploited at elections. Most recently eminent jurists Messrs Doodnauth Singh and Jainarain Singh were victimized by pension denials, the same thing that Burnham did to Balram Singh Rai in the 1960’s.
Dr Steve Surujbally, Yesu Persaud, and Jerry Gouveia were “cussed out.” Ms Surujballly was ostracized at GuySuCo for her husband’s folly of displeasing the regime. Ravi would surely recall that a ROAR activist was murdered on the Essequibo Coast, that his (Ravi’s) wife and children were forced to flee their home when the PPP descended on his corner, and that Ravi himself was threatened at gunpoint by a drunken PPP central committee member on the East Bank.
How different is this from the Burnham era? The answer: Indians replaced Africans. Would the PPP have created a Soviet style communist state with the PNC in 1985? I say definitely and Pandit Reepu Daman Persaud would have got the Hindus to support it.
Pandit Persaud on 10-17-09 on the “sacrosanct night” of Diwali called on Hindus to give President Jagdeo a third term. It seems that party paramountcy extends to Hindus. A third term for Jagdeo would mean that we have to revert to the Burnham Socialist Constitution. Is this not the mirror image of Burnham’s PNC? What is wrong with Hindu leaders? Not so long ago we had Maha Sabha officials telling us that some PNC leaders were deities. Now the Dharmic Sabha pandit wants to make a PPP leader president for life.
Surely Ravi, the Hindu/Indian intellectual cannot be in agreement with Reepu Daman? I urge my friend to rethink his belief, “that “maturity” is demonstrated in a willingness to be positive rather than negative.” You are not educating Indians as you should be doing, rather you are confusing them.
Confused Indians will continue to be manipulated by the PPP. In this way you are unwittingly serving the PPP.
Malcolm Harripaul

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