Shall I ask Uncle Donald to pay for my eye operation?

Jun 14, 2013 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I left for New Amsterdam in the wee hours of Wednesday morning to have an eye operation because my failing sight has returned. My personal eye doctor, after an intense examination recommended surgery outside of Guyana because of the complex nature of the operation. It wasn’t good news. The last time was January 2000 and Dr. George Norton advised immediate surgery in Trinidad.
It is sad that after 47 years of Independence, Trinidad, Barbados and Jamaica offer certain types of eye surgery that cannot be done here and there are no prospects that such technology will arrive in Guyana anytime soon.
I read a few years back that Roger Luncheon went abroad to seek attention for his eye problem. As for my prospects, I may have to ask Uncle Donald as the President is referred to in certain columns in this newspaper, to pay for the medical cost, as Mr. Jagdeo did for then Opposition Leader, Robert Corbin (the published figure by GINA was $10 million).
But then again, I am not an opposition leader and in this country one has to remember what Martin Carter wrote, that a mouth is muzzled by the food it eats. But then again, who says Uncle Donald would approve State payment for my operation?
I haven’t been to New Amsterdam a long time; just passing through during the election season in 2011. After I left my doctor, I decided to spend time checking out New Amsterdam. It is in a vastly different state from when I would visit often during my teaching days at the Berbice campus of UG. It is clear for anyone to see that the closure of the ferry service and the location of the bridge have devastated the town. I felt both sad and annoyed at what New Amsterdam looks like today.
All over Guyana you see the debris of sick politics. All over this country you see the social and moral decay that political and ethnic division brings.
Quite a number of complaints came my way. I was asked not to leave New Amsterdam without some attempt at human rights intervention. A group of parents told me there are horror stories at New Amsterdam Multilateral School. I was moved by the revelation that in the coming days, students have to pay seven hundred dollars for the test paper that will be laid on their desks. I was speechless, but I know Guyana is a country where the most sinister jumbie tales exist in a vortex of bestial realities.
Parents told me they have to fork out money for all types of projects at the school. I was shown a letter sent to all parents asking for financial assistance whenever circumstances dictate. The headmaster, Mr. Dhanraj, informed me that such a letter may have been written during the tenure of his predecessor, Mrs. Jackie Benn, so that is not a matter for him to deal with.
As to the question of parents having to finance various ventures, he agreed that a lawn mower was paid for with parents’ money and students have to pay $700 for test papers, but he sought safety in the fact that those were decisions made by the Parent/Teacher Association, and that he cannot interfere with decisions of that body.
Headmaster Dhanraj recommended that I talk to the Chairman of the PTA, Pastor Charles. I went to speak to the holy man at his church on Main Street. He told me at a PTA meeting attended by over 400 parents, that it was agreed that parents would finance essential needs of the school. He cited a hypothetical example of air-conditioning if necessary. He indicated that he agrees with the charge for the exam sheets.
In Guyana, seven-storey buildings are going up all over the territory and we are building a Marriott Hotel, but students have to pay for their exam sheets. I was informed that this venality also obtains in Georgetown schools.
Berbicians complained to me that patients and visitors cannot use the main gate of the new Berbice Hospital. They have to walk several blocks and enter through the back gate. We accompanied a patient, but the guard turned all of us away. The entrance is only for doctors and their vehicles. I spoke to Dr. Mahadeo, CEO of the Berbice Regional Health Authority. He said that decision was taken after there were two vehicular accidents outside the gate.
We had lunch at New Amsterdam Qik Serve where we were treated with pleasurable courtesy. I met an attendant with a gold tooth that was shining brightly. I told her I came to New Amsterdam to save my eyes, but her tooth was dazzling my eyes. She said, “Freddie, when you go back to Georgetown write about it.”
Well I am doing so now.

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Shall I ask Uncle Donald to pay for my eye operation?

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