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A secret a prominent medical doctor shared with me

Dec 18, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

There isn’t a non-partisan Guyanese, an independent-minded Guyanese who can look at him/herself in the mirror and deny that the PPP Government has outdone previous corrupt governments in the English-speaking Caribbean.
In Antigua and Trinidad there were shamelessly corrupt administrations. Two Prime Ministers were charged after they lost power – Walter in Antigua; Panday in Trinidad. It is literally a joke to compare what takes place here at the moment inside the Government of Guyana with those two former regimes in Antigua and Trinidad
When it comes to Guyana, it is absolutely indecent for any Guyanese citizen of any ethnic background to deny that the present cabal that is in charge of Guyana is more corrupt than the PNC when that party was in power. No decent person should listen to even an utterance that defends the Guyana Government as a more accountable junta in the realm of finance than the PNC Government from 1968.
I lived under President Forbes Burnham, and to say that the PPP Government is not a worst offender in kleptocracy by millions of miles than when Burnham ruled Guyana is equivalent of denying the Holocaust, which is a violation of international law in some countries.
I am deeply convinced that once the PPP loses the elections, Guyana will be catapulted onto the international stage because the leading media houses will report on the trial of dozens of former Ministers and high officials who will be charged with grave financial crimes.
There is no way the new government could escape harsh condemnation of the population if it doesn’t institute charges against most of the leading dictators of the government that would have been voted out of office.
Unlike Trinidad where a few Ministers were prosecuted, should the government change hands in 2011, dozens of high officials will be placed before the courts.
Guyana will make history in the Caribbean with these trials. I am sure many of these little dictators will not be granted bail because the prosecutors will talk about “risk flight” meaning the chance of these accused migrating.
While there may be some support for the PPP in rural areas over the Government’s embrace of Roger Khan, when it comes to corruption, every past PPP voter has expressed disgust at this unprecedented theft of public money that is extremely shameless. That the UK, Canada, the US, World Bank, EU and IDB have not sanctioned the Guyana Government for financial debauchery is beyond belief.
There is a feeling out there, a feeling conveyed to this commentator all the time, that some of the investments of certain billionaires belong to certain highly powerful politicians.
Personally, speaking, I believe so. At least two episodes seem to point to investments that consist of money of certain powerful politicians who got it from corrupt transactions.
Some years ago (I think it was either 1999 or 2000), the son of the lawyer, Lata Ramgopaul, had his wedding in Subryanville. Mr. Ramgopaul is related to my late mom.
I was invited. I sat next to one of Guyana’s most prominent medical doctors. He described what he knew about certain contractors who were overpaid, with the understanding that the part of the sum that consisted of the overpayment would go to Freedom House. Details were provided to me.
After 2002, this doctor became integrated in the power establishment. He was embraced by the PPP and given two valuable positions with the State.
I honestly don’t know why he went to the PPP because he is a very wealthy man and came from a propertied family. The Hindu temple and the land it stood on where my mom worshipped in the 1960s was donated by that family. I guess race eventually took hold of him.
Ethnic consciousness has a terrible hold on people. Ask Rickey Singh, David Dabydeen, Doodnauth Singh and hundreds of East Indian professionals who in the seventies were part of a democracy movement protesting racial discrimination against East Indians by an African dominated PNC Government.
Now the shoe is on the other foot, it is all right to turn a blind eye to discrimination against African people by an Indian dominated PPP regime. I guess as the East Indians say, “is we time now.”
The trouble with that is that “we time now” seems to last forever and by the time “we time now” comes to an end, I’m afraid a certain community would be reduced to fifth class citizens in their own land, a land all of us helped to keep alive through blood, sweat and tears.
History can be a cruel thing, particularly Guyanese history.

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