History has already started judging President Jagdeo harshly

May 06, 2011 Letters

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Dear Editor,
I must say, with all respect due to Mr. Harry Gill, (“I have been judging the President a bit too harshly,” Kaieteur News, May 2), with whom I shared via published letters a low intolerance for the blatant corrupt practices of the Jagdeo administration, that I should be surprised at the epiphany that led to his conversion from a harsh critic of the PPP regime to an advocate-defender of the same regime and its President, but I am not surprised.
It is said that politics is a fluid process that can conform to any changing situation at a moment’s notice, and politicians and people are capable of also conforming at a moment’s notice, so that a position or view once held could be changed at a moment’s notice. Ergo, politics simply trumps principle.
But what epiphany exactly did Mr. Gill receive? On careful reading of his letter, I tried to detect any earth-shaking development that stood out from the norm that already existed for the last five years and on which Mr. Gill offered his well-documented criticisms.
He said he went to the Jagdeo-Ramotar meeting at Club Tobago in Queens, New York, on Friday, April 29, and after listening to “addresses by both Mr. Ramotar and President Jagdeo on the infrastructural development taking place in Guyana, I had to agree that most of what was said is consistent with what I have seen throughout my travels to various regions of Guyana both last year and again during March of this year”.
From the US$2.1 billion debt the PPP inherited in 1992 and which the Jagdeo regime worked in tandem with creditors to have written off or forgiven, to the infrastructural developments funded largely by foreign loans and grants, such as healthcare and educational facilities, roads, etc., all these were right there when Mr. Gill constantly criticised the government’s corrupt practices. So, again, what triggered his epiphany?
Additionally, he noted “the dream of owning a home for most Guyanese have been realised, with thousands more soon to follow. These cannot be denied. The Amerindian communities have benefitted immensely from the policies of the PPP/C, especially in areas of education and healthcare, and they will not forget that”.
Did it actually take the President and Mr. Ramotar’s remarks to open his eyes to what he was already seeing since last year? Or did he see all this infrastructural development but ignored it in order to focus his angry energy at the regime for its blatantly corrupt practices?
Then he made a mind-boggling observation that may actually explain the true reason for his conversion: “For with all his faults, Guyana has made steady progress under President Jagdeo, and I firmly believe this progress will intensify and blossom into something much more beautiful under the leadership of Donald Ramotar if elected”. He actually did close out his letter with this line: “I sincerely hope that there will be a major overhaul of the cabinet when Donald Ramotar is elected, as I hope he will”.
The Donald Ramotar factor, Mr. Editor, may well be the key to understanding Mr. Gill’s conversion, because he went on to assert, “It is important for Donald Ramotar, in his capacity as Political Advisor to the President, to promote zero tolerance for incompetence and insist on getting results from those placed in positions of authority”.
Unless I am missing something, this is quite a quantum leap for Mr. Ramotar, in his conflicting dual capacities as PPP presidential candidate and Political Advisor to the outgoing President, because a political advisor generally is not a person who promotes and insists on anything from persons placed in positions of authority.
But what it goes to show is that Mr. Gill firmly believes that while President Jagdeo may have been his own worst enemy and the cause of the negative public perception of government, the PPP is still best suited to entrust the future of our nation, and that Mr. Ramotar should be the one leading the PPP government in this regard. I really don’t know if his solid embrace of Mr. Ramotar is tied to his sudden softening approach to the President, but his letter is the kind that makes you ponder about the mysterious dynamics of mutating politics.
For example, this one-time harsh critic of the President said he went to the Queens meeting with an “open mind”,   and that “I have no loyalty to anyone or to any political party or organisation, and I’m too independent to have my values compromised”.
Yet it was he who made this stunning observation, “The few and insignificant protesters that were there, were incapable of disrupting the enthusiastic crowd that turned out in support of the PPP/C presidential candidate, and did nothing to change the opinion of anyone there, myself included. There were much more placards than the 30 or so protesters, which was an indication that the opposition expected, or had hoped to get more people to join their camp. This clearly did not happen”.
This dismissal of opposition protestors, among whom he once numbered, is what I call a radical conversion, and while I respect Mr. Gill’s right to convert and preach to the unconverted, I have to say the evidence of blatant corruption in the government that existed alongside infrastructural development cannot continue. Yet, corruption has seeped into the PPP presidential candidacy by way of the candidate being allowed to campaign on taxpayers’ money before being controversially appointed an advisor to the outgoing President with mere months before elections. This is not a sign of change and
hope. In closing, if Mr. Gill history believes he has judged President Jagdeo a bit too harshly, then history has already started judging President Jagdeo harshly, and judging from the Jagdeo-Ramotar shenanigans, if this team succeeds in 2011, then we will just be turning the pages of history to continue reading the harsh realities and hard facts of where President Jagdeo left off. Especially if he is part of a Ramotar administration.
Emile Mervin

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