Alvin Kalicharran’s brother-in-law speaks

Nov 13, 2010 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

The PPP has been in power for 18 years, and it is doubtful that many persons know the name, Lionel Peters, who happens to be the brother-in-law of the famous West Indian cricket star, Alvin Kalicharran.
Over the past ten years no one read anything written about Mr. Peters or seen any printed correspondence in the national newspapers by this gentleman. In October, Mr. Peters broke out on the national stage and has been in the news since then.
As a former member of the PPP highest decision-making forum, the central committee, Mr. Peters for the past month, has been publishing riveting materials about the inner workings of the PPP. His emergence came about when Mr. Ralph Ramkarran in a letter in the newspapers falsely accused me of peddling mischievous information about how the PPP arrived at its presidential candidate for the 1997 elections.
I have written twice before that in its deliberations on its choice, Mr. Ramkarran came up against Moses Nagamootoo and lost, the reason being that critics of Mr. Ramkarran pointed to his refusal to serve in the Cabinet after the 1992 victory. My information came from solid sources within the PPP’s leadership and I stand by what I wrote on this matter over the years.
I need not dwell on it any further since Lionel Peters has trenchantly contradicted Mr. Ramkarran in three letters to the press. Since then Mr. Ramkarran has chosen not to respond. Peters went beyond confronting Ramkarran and has gone in the direction of exposing how Mrs. Jagan ran the PPP with an iron fist.
This is old news, of course, but the value of Mr. Peters’s testimony is that it comes from someone who was in the PPP’s leadership. Even though his pronouncements are known to us decades ago, it will be more convincing to PPP members who tend to disbelieve criticisms of Cheddi and Janet Jagan when they are written by academics.
Here is an unblemished PPP stalwart recording the sordid side of the PPP’s existence for history.
In describing the priceless service Peters gave to the PPP, one of his protégés, former NCN journalist and former leading member of the youth arm of the PPP, Ossie Rogers, in a letter to the press, lionized Mr. Peters and ended his positive assessment by praying for the day the PPP would return to its Jaganite roots.
We see, read and hear these sentiments about Dr. Jagan all the time. I was actually surprised that Gerhard Ramsaroop of the AFC has showered immense praise on Dr. Jagan recently. Gerhard Ramsaroop is intellectually capable of analyzing the egregious mistakes of Dr. Jagan that he is no doubt aware of. Mr. Rogers let us know that his mentor, Lionel Peters remains a strong admirer of Cheddi Jagan.
It is sad that Ramsaroop, Peters and Rogers, all three former top second tier leaders of the
PPP, cannot make the connection between their final exit from the PPP and the nature of Cheddi Jagan’s politics. Scholarly research by these three gentlemen would expose them to the real Cheddi Jagan. How can former PPP cadres fulminate against what the PPP has become and cannot link the degeneracy to the rule of Cheddi and Janet Jagan?
Peters cannot remain a Jaganite loyalist after his bruising evaluation of Mrs. Jagan. Cheddi Jagan was ensconced in the ideology, personality and character of his wife. It is no exaggeration to say that Jagan cultivated the image of the nice-boy leader while he assigned to Mrs. Jagan the role of the executioner
Cheddi Jagan knew his wife ruled the PPP with fascist methodologies and methods. He knew she carried the Macbethian dagger, a dagger that served his purpose. Peters cannot be that myopic to think that the domination of Mrs. Jagan from the sixties until the death of Cheddi was something Cheddi was unaware of.
On the contrary, Cheddi turned to his wife throughout his long career to decapitate those he didn’t like and to elevate the effete underlings that would be his slaves. Look who Jagan was left with after Independence came — semi-literate rural cadres that he housed at Fredom House and put into the leadership of his party.
These are the people that occupy Freedom House and the Government of Guyana the past 18 years. What would the PPP be like if it is to revert to the culture of Cheddi Jagan that Ramsaroop, Peters and Rogers want?
It would be interesting to hear what this entity would be like. Can any of these gentlemen do a description for us?

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Alvin Kalicharran’s brother-in-law speaks

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