A nation of fools brings disrespect unto itself

Dec 22, 2015 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I don’t attend official state functions and social gatherings. One of the reasons is the kind of people you meet. I avoid these avenues because I have to mix with people whose silence and complicity have endangered the future of this country. It becomes personal when consideration is given to the fact that you are a parent.
I couldn’t accept a position on the National Commemoration Commission because I think there were people on that body whose politics endangered my life and jeopardized the future of young Guyanese including my only child. The other day I was going into Kaieteur News while this prominent Guyanese academic was entering.
This was the man who nominated Bharrat Jagdeo for the Nobel Peace Prize. How could I tolerate this gentleman? To deepen the depravity, he declined to confirm that he made the submission. As I am discussing this issue, let me once more apologize to my editor, Adam Harris. In the hectic life of a media operative, you make some bad mistakes. It was Adam who passed on a confidential e-mail sent to him from a friend that proved this chap forwarded Jagdeo’s name for the Nobel Prize. I disclosed that information. I really should not have done so. I do regret that lapse of mine.
I know Harris was displeased. I am still flummoxed at Moses Nagamootoo’s toleration of this other fellow.
Yes, I avoid the cocktail circuit where people with status, wealth, money and doctorates clink champagne glasses while Guyana slides further into the moral cesspool. This column was motivated by the editorial of last Sunday’s Kaieteur News. I quote a section; “What borders on insanity is the Chief Justice’s decision concerning the illegal appointment of former Town Clerk, Carol Sooba. It is highly offensive when the High Court makes a decision that cannot be enforced.”
The Sooba case is one of the largest arguments against the CARICOM states joining the CCJ as a replacement for the Privy Council. How can any society have respect for and trust its judiciary with that kind of quality the judiciary produces in the Caribbean. Isn’t the CCJ drawn from the judges from the CARICOM states?
The editorial says the Sooba judgement borders on insanity. I went further than that in four columns. It was insanity pure and simple. And Guyana accepted that madness. The people who could have at least questioned the soundness of Justice Chang’s decision never said a word. Even the editorial mentioned above does not uplift the spirits – it is anonymous.
I have denounced so many times on this page this decision of Justice Chang that I don’t have the stomach and mental alertness to elaborate for readers who may not know what the story is all about. If they have internet access, they can Google it.
So you go to these social gatherings and you see the crème de la crème of Guyanese society and you know behind the veneer of status lies the emptiness of character. I just keep away from those occasions.
That KN editorial cries out for judicial reform. It cites the ugliness of having one judge sitting as and in the Constitutional Court. I did an entire column on that with the unambiguous position that it makes a mockery not only of the judicial system but the entire country. Any political theorist who passed through a university would tell you that the judicial system is the fulcrum on which justice, rights, liberties and freedom rest. If the legal system is broken so will be the society.
It may be easy to criticize retired Chief Justice Chang and Magistrate Alex Moore, who gave a suspended sentence to an accused convicted of possession of 150 pounds of cocaine and an illegal shotgun. But why focus on the individual decision-maker? What about society’s silence?
A woman spoke to me with anger on the 15-year jail term a convicted man had received from Justice Barlow for the attack on a businessman after he had left the bank with a sum of money. The robbers shot his handyman dead. She was livid but refused my advice to write a letter to the press. She chose silence.
What about the nation’s absolute disinterest in the decline of the country? Shouldn’t that be of immediate concern? Is it possible that Justice Chang said that he will allow Sooba to keep her position even though she sits there illegally because people in Guyana couldn’t be bothered? Is it possible Magistrate Moore was thinking the same way when he sent home the big trafficker? Who respects this country and its people?

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A nation of fools brings disrespect unto itself

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