Burkina Faso and the lost revolution in Guyana

Nov 02, 2014 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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On Tuesday evening at a UG symposium with Enrico Woolford and Dennis Chabrol, a student got up and directed his question to me. He said he strongly resents the things that students have to put up with (he mentioned that for the symposium he had to fetch a chair from another section of UG) and would like my advice as to what to do.
My instruction was that the students should bring the place down. But I did caution him it has to be mass protest, because if not, he will end up being a solitary figure on the picket line. As the evening progressed more questions followed and a student asked all three panelists why Guyana’s youths were so apathetic.
It is not only Guyana’s youths, it is the entire population. Countries we least expect to confront their governments over tyrannical rule are showing the world that terrible governance will not be tolerated. Very few scholars of politics anywhere in the world expected Burkina Faso to implode and explode. But it did in spectacular ways.
Hundreds of thousands of citizens stormed Parliament and burned it down, and moved from street to street targeting people close to the government. It was an outburst of revolutionary spirit nicknamed the African Spring. Most intriguing was the cause of the protest which led to the implementation of a transitional government.
Rewind the tape to Thailand and the Ukraine earlier this year. The Prime Minister of Thailand was toppled, not because of some violently brutal act or a nasty display of venality. Mass protest broke out because the demonstrators accused the Prime Minister of allowing her exiled brother to be the real mover and shaker behind her government.
In the Ukraine, a bloody uprising caused the President to run away from the country and his government crumbled. The reason was no brutal killing of demonstrators or no sickening act of democratic denial. The Ukrainian President did not follow through on a trade deal with the European Union. Surprised as you may be about the cause of the violent Ukrainian demonstrations, that was the direct reason for people taking to the streets.
In the situation in Burkina Faso, the revolutionary energies took over after citizens found out that Parliament was to meet to change the constitution to allow the President, who was in power for twenty years, to seek another term. Annoyed at his attempt at permanent power, they simply burned down the Parliament and now the president has been ousted replaced by a transitional government.
In Thailand, the Ukraine and Burkina Faso, revolutionary uprisings brought down ruling cliques that have not done even a quarter of the things Guyanese have to put up with. There is no question about it, Thailand, the Ukraine and Burkina Faso had better governance than Guyana by millions of miles.
Enrico Woolford, Dennis Chabrol and I gave our respective answers to that student who asked for our explanation on Guyana’s apoplectic young people, but each of us knew that the youth sleep was also symptomatic of a wider problem – the apoplexy of the Guyanese people.
Nothing moves the people of Guyana to vent their anger the way it was done in the Arab Spring, Thailand, the Ukraine and now Burkina Faso. And there is so much horrible governance that should move the Guyanese people. The most recent of course was the shooting to death of three unarmed protestors in July 2012 in Linden. A judicial inquiry by Caribbean jurists found the police culpable.
The officer in charge of the police on that day in Linden has since been promoted to the position where he has administrative control over the most populous region in Guyana – Georgetown. Only Linden protested the killing. No one protested the promotion of the questionable police officer.
We are in the midst of “tapegate.” Those who had read my three columns last week on “tagegate” would know I have refused to name the infamy, “Nandlall” scandal. It is a scandal that reaches into the heart of the hierarchy of state power. Every bit of that conversation raises the hair on your skin. For me the part that is Draculean is when the powerhouse said that when Kaieteur News is attacked innocent employees may die, but in life Peter pays for Paul.
The Thai Prime Minister may have sought her brother’s invisible participation in policy-making. But that was all she did. The Ukrainian President got cold feet and didn’t sign the trade deal. But that was all he did. The President of Burkina Faso asked the Parliament to extend term limits. But that was all he did. All three are gone. In Guyana, the night of the generals will last forever.

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