WPA throws down the gauntlet

Jul 06, 2011 News

… promises to ‘push back’ against PPP attacks on Roopnarine

The WPA yesterday condemned the “attacks on Dr. Rupert Roopnaraine by the PPP and some of its supporters” saying that they were in bad taste and represented the “ultimate in racial scare tactics”.
In a press statement released by the party, the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) slammed the attacks on Dr. Roopnarine featured in the state-owned media pointing out that despite the normalcy of opposing political parties engaging each other in political criticism and debate, the attacks are stretching the limits of that understanding.
The press release pointed out that “The use of Walter Rodney’s memory to disparage the WPA and Dr. Roopnaraine, in particular, is at best cynical. It is also hypocritical, coming from a party which repeatedly described Dr. Rodney in unflattering terms while he was alive and even after his assassination.”
The party lambasted the PPP for failing to conduct an inquiry into the assassination even after almost two decades in office, years which they said were bought at the expense of Rodney’s struggles and sacrifice. The release also called for the PPP to stop using the name and memory of Walter Rodney to score “cheap political points” saying that the late Rodney represented the best in what the Caribbean political culture had to offer and even his name should be “out of bounds” for those who have come to represent the worst of that culture. The use of his name by the PPP was said to be a desecration of the memory of the legend.
The release also commented on the WPA’s decision to become a part of the APNU, the recently formed coalition of opposition political parties saying that “WPA’s decision to be part of APNU is a collective decision that is premised on our long held view that Guyana can only move forward with a government that represents and is accountable to all of its peoples.”
The party posited several theories for the attacks on Dr. Roopnarine, but the only one they chose to present was that of race. The release stated, “The PPP has always deemed Indian- Guyanese leaders outside of its fold to be traitors. Dr. Roopnaraine has been high on that list for the last 34 years.”
They go on to suggest that the attacks are revealing the PPP fear that APNU will prove a threat to the PPP’s “stranglehold on the Indian Guyanese electorate”. It presents the possibility that Dr. Roopnarine may help to sway some of the PPP’s traditional constituency towards the partnership and this is the reason for the “relentless attempts to besmirch his candidacy in the APNU and characterize him as a traitor to Indian-Guyanese”.
The release closes with the WPA throwing down the gauntlet to the PPP saying, “The WPA hereby puts the PPP on notice that it will vigorously push back against this vile attack on its Co-leader and on our party in general.”

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WPA throws down the gauntlet

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