President attacks budget cuts at Highbury Arrival Day celebrations

May 06, 2012 News

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By Leon Suseran
“We have made mistakes– we have probably made many mistakes, but

only a fool who does nothing makes no mistakes”- Ramotar
President Donald Ramotar, speaking to hundreds gathered at Plantation Highbury, East Bank Berbice on Indian Arrival Day yesterday, urged Guyanese to make their voices heard against the parliamentary budget cuts.
The Guyanese leader, who was accompanied by Minister of Health, Dr. Bheri Ramsaran and Adviser, Navin Chanderpal, spent the entire day in Berbice at the Berbice Indian Cultural Committee’s Annual Pilgrimage to Highbury, where the first batch of East Indians arrived in British Guiana 174 years ago.
With AFC Leader, Khemraj Ramjattan present in the audience, Ramotar noted that $21B in funds to develop the productive capacity of Guyana and to “give you a better life” has been slashed in the parliament.
“We were working to build hydro power to give everybody cheap electricity as Linden enjoyed…We don’t want to raise the price of electricity on anyone; we want to bring it down for everyone”.
The President also talked about the One Laptop Per Family programme. “One of the most important programmes because it gives meaning to our philosophy of equal opportunity for all”. He said that this, too “has been slashed [from the

budget] and endangered and you too must make your voices heard to ensure they put it back unconditionally….!”
“I don’t think that I have to bribe anyone to do good for the people of this country and therefore, I ask you to work with us as we build the capacity of our people”.
The President admitted that mistakes were made by the government. “We have made mistakes– we have probably made many mistakes, but only a fool who does nothing makes no mistakes”, the Guyanese leader said, to rousing applause.
“And we will continue to make mistakes because we intend to work very, very hard in the interest of every single Guyanese and to make our country– the best country in this world”.
“When our Indian ancestors landed here for the first time, our country was in a bad shape. Many of the industries were under decline and the owners of the plantation wanted cheap labour to undercut the labour of the free slaves that were here before”.
He noted that it was difficult for them when they came here to work to “restore our country”. From a historical perspective, today, he said we knew it was another important turning point in Guyana’s history and “the struggle that they carried on here, sometimes together, sometimes individually, but they were only the continuation of the struggles our brothers, who came here before– the Slaves– in 1763 in this very county, rose up and delivered the most important blow against slavery in the Western Hemisphere…it was the beginning of the end of slavery in this part of the world”.
Ramotar reminded those present that the East Indians, who came after, continued that great tradition of fighting for freedom. “It was they who called for the right to vote and produce many, many revolutionaries in the process that went on”.
One of the leaders he mentioned was Dr. Cheddi Jagan, “a man whom the indentured labourers of this country gave to the world; an intellectual, a fighter and a revolutionary against oppression everywhere”.
The Guyanese leader noted that the struggle today continues and it has changed a lot. “But we still face a very unequal world where we have a lot of difficulties to carry on”. He explained how international trade still goes against Guyana and the very people who colonialised us in the past, are still ones– “although they are losing their grip gradually– but they still dominate in many of these international institutions”.
He urged Guyanese to carry on the struggles of their ancestors– past and present. “We have to move forward and we can only succeed in these conditions that we have, when we forge unity among all the people of our country”.
He noted that many of the programmes that the government has been designing are important for Guyana to wean itself off of any kind of international aid and dependence and grants. “We must develop them here ourselves”.
“We believe very strongly, that to do that, we must build the capacity of our people and that is why we have been investing heavily in the people of this country”.
Leader of the Alliance for Change, Mr. Khemraj Ramjattan, stated that little did people know that the first boatload of East Indians who arrived here 174 years ago would create a nation “that defied odds and the odds were made even more harrowing when you take into consideration, the climatic, geographic conditions and the diseases that they had to go through”.
Ramjattan said that Guyana has come a far way but the journey is unfinished. “Notwithstanding what you may see happening, we feel that those things must happen for us to move forward [the Budget Cuts]….although lots of people here, sometimes would want to indicate that there are certain negatives even amongst our own people, they are not negatives”.
He noted that people must build on the contradictions.

Guest Speaker at the event, Professor Daizal R. Samad, reminded those present that each and every Guyanese is a miracle that was created, especially the Indian ancestors who came to these shores.
But Guyana’s greatest miracle is the men and women and children of this land.  “When the Whitby landed in Highbury on May 5, 1838, 233 men, five women and six children from India changed this nation forever. Those souls became part of the ancestry of this Guyana, participating in its creation and re-creation with those that came or were here before them: the First Nations, the Europeans and the Africans, especially. But the bringing and carrying of people is no miracle—it happened in many places through the ages.
“When our ancestors were placed alongside each other, they were made to be enemies of each other. It served the master’s purpose for them to fear and hate each other.  They were not enemies, but were made to be so. And the design of hatred and resentment was as deliberate as it was methodical. It is no easy thing to survive that. The true miracle is that we survived the hangman’s rope of hatred—despite the odds”, he said.
Every ethnic group that came to Guyana, he said, has defied all the odds and people must not allow themselves to become resentful and divided under any circumstance.
“We should all celebrate the first landing of Indians to this soil. It is good and it is appropriate, but we should remember that they really did not come here to build a nation, but that this nation is their child born of their struggle, born of their triumph of survival. The child may bear little or no resemblance to the parent, but we are their children nonetheless. We are their miracle child.”
“And as we celebrate one group of ancestors, we celebrate all ancestors.”

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