2013: The year of Donald Medvedev

Jan 08, 2014 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Last year marked two years since Mr. Jagdeo’s reign came to an end. Mr. Jagdeo’s leadership style has replaced the endless debate about the rights and wrongs of President Forbes Burnham.
Unless you are an avaricious beneficiary of Mr. Jagdeo’s largesse or a rabid racist, the conclusion has to be that Mr. Jagdeo’s excesses, his barefaced lack of nationalism and his immense flaws make him the worst leader this country produced since Independence and probably the most callous of all Heads of Government/State in the history of the Caricom region.
It is certain that if any opposition party wins the government in an election or through some unprecedented intervention of nature, there will be a judicial inquiry into Jagdeo’s twelve-year rule with the intention of prosecuting him for legal and constitutional abuse of power. I don’t think any non-PPP government could retain popular support if it does not investigate the tyranny of Mr. Jagdeo.
However strong that desire may be inside the minds of opposition leaders, they have to contend with the brutal reality that once the PPP is in power, Mr. Jagdeo will remain the man behind the throne. Last year showed that the Ramotar regime is under the realpolitik designs of Mr. Jagdeo.
In other words, Mr. Ramotar is not his own man. It is time the press and Guyana’s stand up comedians start to refer to Donald Ramotar as Donald Medvedev, in reference to then President of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev. He was a virtual puppet of former President Vladimir Putin. No one in the world believed that Medvedev was his own man. Everyone in the world knew that Putin was the de facto president. It is exactly the same in Guyana with Jagdeo and Ramotar.
Nothing in 2013 indicated that Mr. Ramotar is possessed of leadership qualities, vision, creative thinking or even self-confidence. To mask his subordination to Mr. Jagdeo, Mr. Ramotar has decided to use rhetoric to advance his personality to the nation.
His first attempt at that was in October last year when he put on a histrionic show at the 50th anniversary of UG’s birth. Raising his voice, he exclaimed in front of his audience that both opposition and the PPP want to see Guyana develop and the differences should not set us apart, instead, opposition critics should put forward their ideas along with the PPP’s and the Government will test them.
In a raised voice he emotionally sprouted out the words, “But for Christ’s Sake don’t let the different ideas paralyze us, let’s try them one at a time.”
It didn’t work for Ramotar because rhetoric, if not backed up by policy implementation, will end up making a President or Prime Minister look foolish. This is what happened to Ramotar in the months of November and December. He did not try any idea by the opposition or critical sections of civil society.
In fact, he rejected any idea that came from these quarters. Mr. Ramotar could not test any suggestion from his critics because Mr. Jagdeo would not have allowed it. One such situation is the budget preparation. In 2013, Mr. Ramotar went about his budget creation for 2014 without any input from the opposition.
Once again when we come to the budget presentation this year, there will be the thing that Ramotar is so afraid of – the paralyzing of Guyanese society. But such a process will come from his rejection of any idea that is not from the PPP.
Ramotar’s failure in 2013 to accept any opposition suggestion will not stop his use of rhetoric, because it is his only strategy for showing that he can say bold things and that he doesn’t live in the shadows of the Champion of the streets of Georgetown where garbage threatens the earth, of which Mr. Jagdeo is a champion.
So predictably, Mr. Ramotar sung his predictable hymn on the last day of 2013. He urged all Guyanese to work together and exclaimed as he did in October last year at UG that bitter politics will not be a good example for the nation’s youth. The very youth of which according to the World Bank, 82 percent of them leave Guyana permanently when they acquire a tertiary education.
Ramotar will continue with this kind of talk because that is all he can do. He has no space to manoeuvre to become his own man. In fact after Mr. Jagdeo, the next person in charge of Guyana is Roger Luncheon. Next is Gail Teixeira with Ashni Singh and Irfaan Ally close behind. Where is Ramotar? Far behind! People without creativity are never in front. They will never be.

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