The truth has too many legs Joey!

Oct 28, 2010 Letters

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Dear Editor,
I had intended to pen this letter some days ago but my computer crashed and I have been out of commission since.
When I saw Joey Jagan’s letter in SN of October 6th 2010 labelled, “Lionel Peters irks Cheddi Jagan”, I was really perplexed as to why. Then it dawned on me that it was not Dr Cheddi B. Jagan senior, that was being referenced but “Baby Doc”.
Joey states in his opening paragraph, “in which he (Lionel) concocts total lies about my mother’s dealings with the PPP leadership, and his claim that Mrs. Janet Jagan was trying to make me President of Guyana, is so far from the truth that this man should hide his head in shame”.
Joey, I do hide my head in shame these days, for working ‘beyond the call of duty’ to bring the PPP/C to power in 1992. In fact, I do tell friends to kick me where the sun don’t shine, for doing so.
Where was Joey prior to 1992? Why did he suddenly discover the PPP, post 1992 after it ascended to power?
Joey’s claims, that he was not being groomed for the presidency flies against reality. In fact, prior to the 1992 elections, the question of CBJ’s succession occupied the party and one option was that Joey be brought back and prepared for succession. A source, who was a member of the Propaganda Committee of the PPP, indicated that this discussion took place within that Committee as well. And the fact that Joey was fast tracked to parliament, a process that contravened the regulations and practice of the PPP testifies to this reality. But it seems that Joey wanted to be immediately catapulted to the top and when this did not happen he rolled away.
Is it not true, Joey, that you were a member of the Association of Concerned Guyanese (ACG-Canada), but you came to New York and indicated to them, ACG-US, that your mother had given you authority to take charge of that body, when Arjune Karshan was in charge, and this caused a serious riff?
Is it not true that you also became a paid member of the PPP on a Sunday in August of 1997 at Freedom House, when your membership was written up by a party organiser, not from GT? The measures to which the Jagans went to foster you on the PPP and to pave the way for your succession, in spite of the fact that you never did enjoy any camaraderie with the rest of the PPP leadership! This was due to your non-involvement in the local struggle.
This is the same reason why Ralph Ramkarran is not a shoo-in presidential candidate and the sole reason why he will never get the nod from that “powerful eight-man body within the Exco” that you Joey not my words has always railed about?
Did you not form a political party in Guyana, the Unity Party, (UP) to advance your political ambitions in Guyana?
Wasn’t your son also on the platform in 1997, with his grandmother, being presented to the country? Isn’t your son currently a financial member of the PPP? For what purpose if not dynasty?
What has happened to Joey’s political party that was supposed to take Guyana by storm?
Joey, did you not visit my Insurance Office on Liberty Avenue, Queens, New York in the Spring of 2001 and try to impress upon me to come and join your party, to help you organise your intended struggle, using the following words, “All you good guys over here now, Peters you got to come back and help me build my party”.
Why did you, Joey, refuse to answer the questions and subsequently terminated the interview, by the reporter from the Caribbean Voice” after the third question?
These were three of a number of questions posed to you by The Caribbean Voice after you requested an interview.
There are more Questions than answers Joey.
“My mother was a dedicated Marxist and her politics espoused those positions. I am a dedicated free enterprise/capitalist, oriented towards the system of American free enterprise, thus the opposing views between us; she would never have “chosen” me to lead the PPP and become president because my views are not to the PPP’s liking”, stated Joey in his quoted letter against me.
The Guyanese nation, both at home and in the Diaspora, would finally be happy to learn that you are a “dedicated free enterprise/capitalist, oriented towards the system of American free enterprise” so why join the Marxist-Leninist PPP/C after your father died, but under your mother? The navel string connection my boy! Something smells to high heavens! It does not tale rocket science to decipher what was in the works Joey!
Joey further states in his diatribe of October 6th, “Peters was a political player, but a rank opportunist and now he surfaces to sling mud, lie about almost everything and inject himself into the current political debates.
This man is a political “has-been” and will go no where with his lies, distortions and shameful assertions which all ring in our ears: “Mr. Lionel Sour Grapes Peters”- a loser if we ever saw one!
Quiet a loaded statement, Joey.
Rank opportunist with what? I never asked for anything in the PPP, nor did I accept any assistance from the PPP while a member or worker.
I remember your father, who used to pick up my Wife every morning to take her to work with him, instructing Mike Persaud, then manager of Freedom House, to find out from Peters what help he/she needed on the construction of his/her house at Bel Air, Greater GT in 1990 and for him to ensure that that was done. I never benefited from anything under the PPP/C Administration.
In fact they hounded me out of every job or tried to do so. In fact there was a group discussion involving Feroze Mohamed when he Feroze remarked that, “That chap Lionel Peters is like a cork, every time we try to keep him down he keep popping up back all over the place” In fact, Feroze as a member of the Govt.
Representative on the Board of the New Guyana Airways Corporation had a single agenda. My boss in the Private Sector, Anthony Mekdeci, on his return from every board meeting used to ask me, “Lionel, what did you do to those people that they hate you so much?”
Joey, your father used that same word in another time and context:
At a resuscitation meeting of the PYO in 1967 at Freedom House, the minutes of which I saw and read, your father called Mr. Moses Bhagwan, in his absence, a “ Careerist and Opportunist” for leaving his post as head of the PYO and proceeding to the UK to study Law in 1964, instead of accepting a party scholarship and proceeding to the Socialist world, to be indoctrinated in Marxism-Leninism, to return and become a cog in the wheel of the PPP.
Isn’t it true also that your father and mother sent you and all his brothers and sisters to study in the West instead of the fabled East, so that they could build a family qualified to run the affairs of Guyana?
As to being a “political has been etc, etc, etc” my best years are ahead of me and the Guyanese people will be my judge.
I shall be back in the trenches where I rightfully belong, in the forefront of the peoples’ struggle to liberate my dear land of Guyana, more dearly to me that all the world!
I have no apologies if by stating the truth as I know them is “slinging mud” and “lie about everything”.
Not one word that I have written is in “the arena of half truth, fabrications and calumny, lies, distortions and assertions”. I shall be borne out! And time and struggle are on my side and will bear me out.
The truth shall prevail in the ultimate end. The truth has too many legs, Joey!
Lionel Peters

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