Parapet ownership and class arrogance in Guyana in 2014

Mar 13, 2014 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I have absolutely no objections and will have none to people who luxuriate in la dolce vita. It is the right of the rich to spend their money on escapades if they want to. It is the right of the wealthy to stage nocturnal parties where fine wines are thrown onto the grass in drunken abandonment and the morning after the dogs, while peeing on the lawns, get drunk from the smell of the intoxicants.
Class snobbery is a fact of life; Gandhi and Mandela did not stop it, Castro tried and Obama will not be able to (ultra liberals like Obama and the Clintons have their fair share of super-wealthy friends). What I will certainly object to is when the working people are discriminated against by the wealthy folks and no organization or political party or civil society group comes to their rescue.
I don’t know Mr. Leon Rockcliffe. I can’t remember meeting anyone by that name or seeing the person. I don’t know anything about a citizen named Leon Rockcliffe but I do vaguely recall that he had a good relationship with my editor at the Catholic Standard, Father Andrew Morrison. And I do recall that Mr. Rockcliffe was a fellow traveler (no cynicism intended) with the GUARD organization in 1991.
Since my knowledge of Mr. Rockcliffe is bare it would be presumptuous and impertinent of me to comment on his politics. I have read many of the letters he has written over the years and still am impressed by a wonderful analysis by him in which he described how under President Desmond Hoyte, the law was changed to stop the seizure and sale of buildings whose owners failed to pay their rates and taxes.
Hoyte acted to stem the corruption that was going on at City Hall.
In the February 19, 2014 edition of the Stabroek News, Mr. Rockcliffe published a very informative letter about the virtual “nationalization” on the public parapets by business and individuals. But the letter is notable for what it omitted as for what it contained.
In the March 10, 2014 edition of the Stabroek News, an entire page was allocated to Mr. Rockcliffe’s complaint and spiced up with four photographs of “parapet hijackers” but as with Mr. Rockcliffe’s letter, some omissions are unfortunate.
Let’s go back to a few years ago. The unthinkable occurred in Subryanville – Mrs. Mae French in partnership with the upper middle class in Georgetown opened a huge private school. There was absolutely no criticism. One had to be dishonest not to know that traffic would be a problem.
A few years after Mae’s School was established, the brother of the infamous Ed Ahmad (at the time Mr. Ed Ahmad was of unknown quantity) began construction of a business place, not in the heart of Subryanville where the school is, but on the periphery. Actually the construction was more in Sheriff Street than inside Subryanville.
Then the unthinkable occurred in Subryanville again – citizens of Subryanville sought and got an injunction against Mr. Ahmed. Since then the business was completed and is named Century 21.
Mae’s School is three times the size of Century 21 and is a traffic hazard on Sheriff Street. Mae French has brought another school on a tiny street named Middleton Street and it is a traffic nightmare.
I have to take that street daily and I am literally fed up. But go and see what has been done. The school has taken over the parapet, enclosed it and has a canopy over it. Let’s go back a few years again.
I had a confrontation with Police Commissioner Henry Greene when the Beharry family complained of UG shuttles for East Coast students parking on the parapet outside the family mansion. But the mansion was so long that the shuttles had nowhere to go. Greene chased them off.
Since then, the Beharry family has taken over the long, long parapet and driven large poles into the ground thus literally taking over the parapet. And UG is silent. And this has disappointed me with Vincent Alexander.
The Stabroek News featured a photo of the Hot and Spicy Restaurant and Mr. Rockcliffe mentioned that operation too. This is a very small business two blocks east of a humongous fast food empire recently opened up at the junction of Lamaha and Albert Streets. The parapets and pavements on Lamaha Street and Albert Street have been virtually hijacked by this business place. But it was omitted by Mr. Rockcliffe and there was no photo of it in the Stabroek News’ feature.
Do race and class have anything to do with it?

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