Ruling class racist ideology is back in vogue in Guyana

Jun 30, 2010 Letters

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Dear Editor,
Of late, many are calling for Guyana’s Obama to step forward. Such a frequent and sad refrain is most informative in helping us to reflect on the state of our very racially divided society. Reflect on what Guyana and Guyanese have become.
If Barack Obama were to contest a National election in Guyana he would not win. He could not win. His race and not his ideas would be the decisive factor. Nor would his personality, competence, experience or social contributions to a multi-racial society count.
Today, we need to look deeply into ourselves. Our racism (and we deny it) has reached its zenith. Daily there is a coercive psychological war that directly and indirectly states that no African Guyanese is qualified to be President of Guyana.
The fact that African Guyanese came here180 years before Indo Guyanese and toiled in the most inhumane conditions of brutal slavery and provided 180 years of free labour is irrelevant.
The fact that thousands and thousands of Africans died during slavery is irrelevant. The fact that African slaves built Guyana from jungle and swamp is irrelevant.
The fact that history has recorded that Africans “had driven back the sea and had cleared, drained and reclaimed 15,000 square miles of forest and swamps. This is equivalent to 9,000,000 acres of land. In short, all the fields on which the sugar estates are now based were cleared, drained and irrigated by African labour forces. All the plantations now turned villages and cities were built by unpaid African labour. In the process of building these plantations, careful research has shown that Africans installed the following (1) 2,580,000 miles of drainage canals, trenches and inter-bed drains, (2) 3,500 miles of dams, roads and footpaths, and (3) 2,176 miles of sea and river defence.
The fact that the  Venn Commission of 1945 noted in the report that “to build the coastal plantation alone, a value of 100,000,000 tons of earth had to be moved by the hands of African slaves “(without machinery), this too is irrelevant.
Given the current deep racism that prevails (it is so deep that we deny it), Barack Obama’s Party would be told to choose an Indian presidential candidate instead of him or they would simply lose. The PPP would not select him as shown by the twice racially motivated and unconstitutional removal of Sam Hinds by the PPP. Constitutionally, Sam Hinds should have been the president of Guyana in a race-blind PPP.
The PNC would not choose him because they would be told they need an Indian candidate to lead the PNC since Indians will only vote for an African based Party if the Presidential candidate wasn’t African.
The AFC wouldn’t choose Barack Obama because he wasn’t a Founder Leader.
GAP/ROAR wouldn’t choose him because he isn’t Indian or Amerindian.
The Unity Party wouldn’t choose him because it is Cheddi Joey Jagan’s Party and the WPA wouldn’t choose him because Rupert Roopnarine is their designated political leader.
In short, Barack Obama, as an African Guyanese would not qualify to be President of Guyana in today’s “oh beautiful Guyana”  although he can certainly be the President of the United States of America, the most powerful country on Earth.
Daily in Guyanese politics we see the ugly smiling face of the race card. It is always played by the PPP and now by several members of the AFC, in recent letters and arguments. They hope to argue that the PNC cannot lead a combined opposition because it is the PNC. Amazingly, some of the leadership elements of the PNC who want to dislodge Robert Corbin extra-constitutionally, also play this race card. Is this our democracy? Is this a meritocracy? Is this what we teach our children? Is this who we really are? Is this what we call Guyanese culture? Or are we hard and soft core racists masquerading as enlightened people?
Race and reverse racism have become a growth industry in Guyana. It is now the biggest trump card in the Guyanese pack. Political jokers and racial entrepreneurs have become wild and are either governing the country with their unmitigated corruption, deep bankruptcy of ideas and personality. They practice an in-your-face kind of deep racism that is beyond belief but they call it politics.
Guyana’s three card monte at the next 2011elections, if the current deep racism continues, will only be filled with cards of one race. But we are told Guyana is not a racially divided society even by those who claim to be agents of change. Vote for me. We are different. We are non-racial. Look at me. We don’t even go to our own cultural events less they call us Afro-centric or Indo-centric. And we can’t be seen as that. How lost are these souls who want to lead us when they can’t even lead themselves and accept whom they are.
Perhaps, it is time for Africans to demand separation. It is the only way they will have a presidential candidate or someone whom embraces their own culture. Maybe, as democracy dictates, it may be the only way they can govern themselves.
The pattern is clear. The Annan Boodhrams and Vishu Bisrams and Satishes of the world are becoming “the new hurricanes of protest” The PNC has been out of power for 18 years. Many of the young Guyanese voters have never lived under PNC rule. Yet they are given a daily dose of racial poison about the PNC and hence about African Guyanese. Young Africans in Guyana are told in every which way…you are inferior. Only someone from a different race can govern you. You are not smart enough. You are not human enough. You are not worthy enough. This sounds like the arguments about slavery: “oh, they are uncivilized and we are doing them a favour”.
What we are talking about is not democracy it is racial demagoguery. It is racial profiling. It is domestic terrorism of the mental type. It is subliminal. It is wicked. It is Hitlerlike. It is psychological warfare.
Two years ago, we heard this deeply held racism during Indian Arrival Day, when Anil Nandalall stated that “We came as beggars and today we are Kings… and East Indians have dominated in every sphere of life in this country – in the area of politics, law, finance, business, literature, sports and you name it”.
And although 95 % of this is untrue (I concede only the area of business and finance (I even ignore drug wealth) , Clive Lloyd and Roy Fredericks are still the only Guyanese cricketers in a West Indies greatest eleven .)…this is the impression young Africans are being given. This is the impression young Indians are given. This reinforces the caste system in religious literature. No wonder Africans want to bleach themselves.
The point of this letter is a simple one. We want an Obama but he must not be Black. We want change but we argue for an Indian leader to lead an African Party but not for an African to lead an Indian Party.
We want a society that is free of race, yet our every solution is based on race. A master race.
Everyone says we are a Land of Six people…One People, One nation, One Destiny. Yet every act, every message denies Africans their dignity, their human rights and their pride. This is not change. This is racism.
Ruling class racist ideology is back in vogue in Guyana and old racial stereotypes are being fostered and nurtured by
A very intelligent and articulate blogger on face book keeps reminding Guyanese that we need a Government of National Unity or we need to separate. He has recently stated:
“The idea that the African Guyanese population has to subjugate its security fears in order to get PPP supporters to abandon the ethnic electoral plantation is insulting. We need to become intolerant of these kinds of self serving idiocies. PPP supporters were not tolerant of any suggestion that they should compromise their security concerns during the governance of the PNC, and black activists that lent them support never demanded this. Why is this demand now being made of a population group after the regime in power gave the nelson eye to lynching squads led by two Indian supporters of the PPP rampaging through that community kidnapping, torturing and killing people at will. There is an insipid argument that emanate from PPP ethnicists that the PNC has to be destroyed in order for Guyana to move forward. But on the destruction of the PPP which has been in power for 18 years, there is total silence. Moreso, if you say so…you are labeled a racist and anti-Indian.
Today, we are faced with a “magnificent masquerade of change”. That has dangerous implications. In essence, some Guyanese want to end racism by preaching and practicing racism.
We are indeed an extraordinary people with lost souls who worship at the altar of a special type of evilness and deception. A true coalition of the insane.
As the great Martin Carter once said:
This is the dark time, my love,
It is the season of oppression, dark metal, and tears.
It is the festival of guns, the carnival of misery.
Everywhere the faces of men are strained and anxious.
Guyana does not have an Obama. And never will have one because the political culture will kill him before he rises. None of our politicians (PPP, PNC, AFC) have done anything remotely comparable to anything Obama did before becoming prominent: working in poor communities, sharing ideas of hope, serving people instead of wanting them to serve him.
What Guyana needs is a Gorbachev. Someone in the PPP with a heart for justice. Someone in the PPP with a soul for Guyana. Someone in the PPP who thinks all races are equal and that Guyana belongs to all races. This is a more likely scenario than finding an Obama who in Guyana’s case, if you follow the racist logic…must be Indian.
Eric Phillips

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