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The facts. The reaction. The truth

Dec 20, 2010 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Last Wednesday, at his press conference to discuss his complaint against Norway and the World Bank, Mr. Jagdeo once against personally attacked me. It comes with the territory so there should be no agitation on my part. What I find truly disgraceful is Mr. Jagdeo’s inability to intellectualize and he puts it on display so often. I honestly think Mr. Jagdeo should stop it. It is demeaning to his presidency.
All that I wrote about came from Mr. Jagdeo’s own mouth. Yet he lashed out at me claming that I am a poor academic who cannot put up a logical argument. That accusation I can turn against Mr. Jagdeo and the facts are there to support me. Here are the facts. Let me say up front that I am not going to make myself a comic like Mr. Jagdeo’s advisor, Dr. Randy Persaud. He published a long letter to the Guyana Historical Society stating his curriculum vitae. It was long as the Essequibo River. Whether it is factual is another matter.
I have been to three universities including two of the best in the world and one that is the top of the list in Canada. This record is higher than ninety five percent of the academics Mr. Jagdeo surrounded himself with including those that he put in high places at UG. That is all I am going to say about my curriculum-vitae for now. Mr. Jagdeo has six months of his presidency left and for the umpteen time, I challenge him to an open debate on general politics of any kind. Now for Mr. Jagdeo’s reaction to the facts that came out of his mouth and the description of the truth about the money he didn’t get from Norway.
I read an article in the Guardian (UK) newspaper based on an interview Mr. Jagdeo gave that newspaper and also its report of what he said in Cancùn. First, the journalist wrote that Mr. Jagdeo’s presidency was in trouble over the yet to be collected first installment of $US30M from Norway. I wrote that Mr. Jagdeo must have told the journalist something to the effect for her to make that judgement. Secondly, Mr. Jagdeo is quoted in the news item as saying that the process to negotiate for the first disbursement was humiliating. Here was an admission on the part of Mr. Jagdeo himself that his LCDS thing was not going smoothly. He has serenaded Guyanese with his LCDS success yet went on international television and admitted his attempt to get Norway to pay was humiliating.
Thirdly, I commented on the fact (yes a fact) that the LCDS thing could not have been that attractive and phenomenal if Mr. Jagdeo cannot draw down. If as Mr. Jagdeo and his school of Guyanese advocates tell the nation about this pioneering venture that will be his legacy, why then did he go complaining in front of the Guardian? I did not invent that story. It came from Mr. Jagdeo’s mouth. Fourthly, I made the point in one of the two articles I wrote on his failure to collect the $US30M that Mr. Jagdeo had agreed to the choice of the World Bank to monitor Guyana’s compliance in the Norway covenant. Why then was he complaining that the World Bank is the culprit in the non-receipt of the $US30M so far?
Fifthly, I quoted the PM of Norway himself who told Cancmn that Norway wants to know if the carbon in the trees were sequestered. He was most simply saying we cannot pay until we see that there are results. The word “results” was used by the Norwegian PM. Sixthly, in my second column on the fiasco in Cancùn, I described the reaction of the Caribbean Director of the World Bank. She said that Norway’s money to Guyana is development resource and the Bank wants to see how it is spent. Again, most simply, it meant that the Bank is closely watching Guyana on how the Government spends aid money.
There were two broad conclusions in those two commentaries on the debacle with Mr. Jagdeo’s LCDS thing. One is that the money is being strictly monitored because the Bank and Norway are aware of kleptomania in Guyana. The other is that Mr. Jagdeo’s grand success in his LCDS suffered a puncture in all four wheels. If he was seen as such a big champion of REDD throughout the world, why hasn’t that heroic status been recognized by Norway and the World Bank and they are lining up to give him his money? Mr. Jagdeo is embarrassed and he tried to save face by cussing me down.

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