Distorting the facts

Oct 06, 2011 Editorial

Historians have been known to reproduce conditions that have not been accurate. For example, Guyanese have for years grown up hearing about the Berbice Slave Rebellion on February 23, 1763. This belief influenced Guyana’s republic anniversary.
Similarly, other events have either been distorted with the passage of time. They have either been exaggerated or diminished. Guyana with its largely undocumented post-independence history may find itself relying on anecdotal episodes to capture pieces of its history. One good thing is that there are newspapers clippings but even then, reporters would see the same event in a different light.
The nation has seen efforts to negate all that went on prior to the advent of the People’s Progressive Party to government. The nation is told that roads were so deplorable as to hinder travel. The impression is that every road was in this state. The truth is far from this but the lazy historian would latch on to the utterings being made today to establish a portion of the history of the roads in Guyana.
Similarly, young people are being asked to believe that Amerindians did not access academic education until after 1992. It matters not that some of the Amerindians holding high office or excelling in their profession had accessed schooling long before the PPP came to office. The eye of the beholder fashions the facts that later form part of history.
It is a fact that the television licence granted to CNS6 has been suspended for a period of four months. History will record that the station went off the air on October 3, 2011. Research would indicate that the television station had its licence suspended on three previous occasions for indiscretions. It will show that the first suspension was for a day and with each transgression of the broadcast licence the suspensions were for longer periods.
This suspension could very well be recorded as being based on the recommendation of the owners. On Tuesday, President Bharrat Jagdeo proclaimed that he acceded to the wishes of Ms Savitri Singh, wife of the television station owner, Chandra Narine Sharma.
At a meeting with the head of state on Friday, Ms Sharma proposed that the suspension be for a period of four months. The impression is that it was Ms Singh who proposed the period of suspension. It is the same with a person faced with a prison sentence. This person appears before a judge or magistrate and is faced with a jail term.
If the proposed jail term is high but the victim is offered an alternative then the person is going to suggest a lower term. But this does not mean that the person actually fixed the jail term. That was there. All the person did was to beg for a reduction.
Ms Singh was facing an eight-month period of suspension. She simply begged for a reduction and got her wish. To suggest that she recommended the suspension is dishonest. A historian looking back at the printed word or even the recorded statement on the issue could very well conclude that had Ms Singh not recommended the four-month suspension then there might not have been any. The historian may miss that she begged. President Jagdeo ignored that Mr Sharma begged for two months. If there was a choice then the two-month request should have been taken into consideration. But that was not the case.
Politicians are known to twist situations to suit the occasion. They have been known to lay off people but tried to let the people believe that they were being done a favour. They hiked taxes and sold to the people the view that they were actually better off paying the higher taxes.
The bottom line is that there was a suspension; that the Advisory Committee on Broadcasting suggested a longer period of suspension; that Ms Singh asked for a smaller period because a suspension was imperative.
Similarly, the nation is going to pay more for the hydroelectric project. President Jagdeo, however, is selling to them that by doing so they will pay less for the electricity generated. Who knows? The message may very well be that the people opted to pay more for the project because they wanted cheaper electricity.
The truth is that they had no choice.

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