The compound where Mr. and Mrs. Mootoo were murdered

May 16, 2013 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I live in the same compound where Mr. and Mrs. Mootoo were murdered last Friday. It is called, Area Q, Turkeyen. It is bordered on the west by the Caricom Secretariat, the north by the Atlantic, the south by Cyril Potter College and the east by Cummings Lodge. It is referred to as Guysuco Gardens or Guysuco Housing Scheme.
It is a compound with a sordid history. It was prime real estate that was donated by Guysuco to its senior staff through a Cabinet decision in 1994. The prices Guysuco sold the lots for ranged from $80,000 to $250,000.
It was a giveaway (not for me, I bought my land years after for a few million dollars from someone who was generous to me because he could have got a few millions more).
This was one of the first acts of Cheddi Jagan after he became President in 1992 showing his true colours within the race context.
In 1994, Guysuco senior staff had more Africans than Indians. Yet out of the 78 lots sold (for a song by Dr. Jagan), eighty percent of the recipients were Indians. I have documented this political abomination and ethnic bias in my research, “Ethnic Power and Ideological Racism: Comparing Presidencies in Guyanese history,” which forms the fulcrum of my defence in the libel that Bharrat Jagdeo, while as President, brought against me
Mr. Jagdeo, in his eulogy at the funeral of Reepu Daman Persaud, referred to a section of that research. He pointed to the justification of a large number of Indians in the higher echelons in the public service. He said they deserved to be there.
They were there because Jagdeo put them there. Mr. Jagdeo was not on the witness stand so Guyana didn’t get a chance to hear him justify how in 1994 when Guysuco was awarding these house lots to its managerial staff, eighty percent of the awardees were Indians when eighty percent of Guysuco’s managerial system were made up of Africans.
This was the beginning of the PPP’s forward ethnic drive. But it came too close to the assumption of power of Dr. Jagan so Guyanese never zeroed in on this clear signal that ethnic favourtism was coming. In addition the PNC was burnt out and hadn’t the energy to fight Dr. Jagan’s creeping anti-African racism (we should remind readers that Dr. Jagan received the Oliver Tambo Award).
The second reason why Area Q, Turkeyen has a soiled history was that it was originally put forward by UG lecturers as the site where there would be a housing scheme for academics that had served the institution for ten years and more and were still on the staff.
There was immense disappointment among UG teaching staff when Dr. Jagan gave the estate over to Guysuco managers. The compound became known nationally when for three consecutive days on its front page Kaieteur News highlighted the macabre situation where the Ministry of Works and Transport cleared the trench on the southern side of the Railway Embankment and refused to touch the part of the trench right outside my home.
The lots in the compound have been bought out because the original awardees already had posh houses. So they sold their lots for roughly around ten million dollars each (except my generous seller).
Current price is fifteen million dollars and up. Some Guysuco managers built mansions there and are renting them out to the diplomatic community. On the estate can be found the home of the daughter of Mr. Kellawan Lall; the sister of Bibi Shadick, a PPP big wig; Yog Mahadeo, former CEO of GT&T; and some wealthy Indian business tycoons. Mr. Ian Mc Donald has a plot there too. The diplomats are moving out and a few foreign nationals have turned their backs on the site within the last two years because the road (there is only one road that twists and turns its way in the compound) is one of the worst in the world.
The press saw it for themselves when they covered the double homicide.
I keep my distance in the compound. I am not interested in the company of wealthy people. As Paul McCartney put it, “I will always be a working class boy.” Given my philosophy on my country, I doubt the wealthy folks in the compound care to see or notice me. But I also keep my distance because that is a place where most of the inhabitants support the PPP and at the last election voted for the PPP.
Year after year, they “bitch” about this long and winding road but election time they vote PPP. When you see that road you want to know how any human being can be that stupid. You want to know if it was God that created human beings.

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The compound where Mr. and Mrs. Mootoo were murdered

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