Clinton Urling, Raphael Trotman and all that jazz

Oct 02, 2012 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I taught Clinton Urling, the Chairman of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce, at UG, and he must have accepted that I was a good lecturer because he sought two recommendations from me; coming to my home on both occasions. One of his intended universities was the London School of Economics. Of course he got my endorsement.
Last Saturday evening I ran into Urling in the mini-mart at the Texaco gas station on Vlissengen Road. I inquired as to why I never saw any comment from him about the termination of my UG contract five months before it was scheduled to end, and in the middle of UG’s academic year. He had a Fanonesque smile on his face and asked what I think he should compose. I replied that he should know what he should write. He said his comments are coming on Sunday.
Funny! The contract termination was on January 18, but Urling said he will write about it on October 7. If my arithmetic serves me right that would be eight months, two weeks after the event. One hopes Urling does not take nine months to get things done for the Chamber of Commerce. There will be no statement by Urling on October 7 on my contract termination because as soon as this KN edition is read today, Urling will get his telephone calls. Urling forgot that I was his university teacher so I am educated enough to understand him and his Fanonesque mask.
Before I left the Texaco shop, he told me that he was still my friend to which I replied that I don’t need his friendship. Honestly, if Clinton Urling is my friend so is the guy that tried to kill me on August 16 this year after I left the People’s Parliament. With friends like Urling, I surely don’t need enemies. I find Urling amusing. Of course, I will become a disliked columnist for what is written here just as I faced intense criticism from some of the supporters of the Speaker of the Assembly, Raphael Trotman, when I chastised him in a piece titled, “The Inscrutable Language of Raphael Trotman,” on June 26, 2012
In that article I was critical of Trotman for publicly saying the following words about the Government: “Despite the rhetoric and what’s happening in the public domain there are good thoughts and views being expressed… we are not getting a sense that government is withdrawing necessarily…”
This is one of the AFC leaders (he sits in the Executive Committee of the AFC) speaking about the PPP Government. Since he mouthed off those words I almost lost my life in an attack the police have failed to investigate. Since Trotman uttered those words, David Hinds faced some nasty episodes of victimization. And naked power has got even uglier. Now Trotman is at it again.
On receiving the reports for 2011 from the Auditor-General, Mr. Trotman told the select audience that he invited, including Gino Persaud, the President of the Transparency Institute, that the completion of the reports on time was a break with past tradition, meaning in the days of PNC Government. Christopher Ram put it this way, “He drew comparison with what took place twenty-one years ago.”
It boggles the mind to understand why Trotman would not judge Guyana on what we have today, but make comparison to the past when over half the population is not aware of what took place twenty-one years ago.
This same man campaigned for the opposition during the election, but since he became Speaker of the National Assembly, we have heard not one word of condemnation of the Government for the phantasmagoria of horrible depravities committed on Guyana since Trotman’s party, the AFC, and APNU won a Parliamentary majority. Not even a word on one violation or one act of venality by the PPP Government.
On Saturday evening at the People’s Parliament, I told Gino Persaud that he should not have accepted Trotman’s invitation. What was the purpose of the presence of Transparency Institute? Unless Trotman wanted to give an image to the PPP Government.
If Mr. Trotman continues on this journey of praise for the PPP, the AFC has to know that he will become an embarrassment to them. These strange utterings of Trotman in June and September come at a time when there is growing frustration and mounting disappointment about the non-achievements of the combined opposition. I say most honestly, I see and hear words of harsh criticism against the combined opposition, particularly APNU (they are the bigger party of course), from Guyana since November 2011. The AFC should monitor Trotman.

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Clinton Urling, Raphael Trotman and all that jazz

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