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These photographs tell the story of a failed 50-year-old journey
From reading my columns, you would know that I politely (it was a polite “no thank you” 
reaction) declined the Government’s invitation to sit on the National Commemoration Commission. I could not invoke philosophical decency to participate in a national body whose purpose is to instill in Guyanese the conscious desire to celebrate 50 years of Independence.
I couldn’t abandon my philosophical conceptions of Guyana and ask the people of this country to rejoice in the achievement of 50 years of Independence. In those 50 years we have achieved very little in physical and economic tangibility and nothing, absolutely nothing, in moral redemption. I love my country, have never migrated from it, would not leave it, but it is my intellectual conclusion that it has been an unworkable construct since Independence in 1966.
I believe some countries are enduring tragedies. Russia, Mexico, Pakistan are definitely way on top of the list. It could be seriously argued that Mexico is a failed state. But I would put Guyana right next to Mexico.
What is there to rejoice about when May 26, 2016, comes around? Believe me, a pound of imported salted boneless cod in this country costs $4,000. Go to any supermarket and you will see that. A packet of locally salted banga or trout or snapper costs $680. You have to strip, clean and debone it. Only the wealthy classes could buy that boneless salted fish. We do not manufacture 
boneless salted fish. We do not produce locally canned or boxed fruits, juices, vegetables and milk. Go to any supermarket and a dozen of varieties of boxed milk can be seen, but none comes from Guyana. But we are celebrating 50 years of Independence. The obvious question is; what have we manufactured and produced in those fifty years? The answer is a sad one – sugar which is dying.
One day about four years ago, I looked onto the Railway Embankment from my bedroom window and saw a GPL crew in an expensive vehicle lifting the technicians on a conveyor box way into the skies. They were fixing the lights on the poles. But after that, a joke was born. Every three months that vehicle comes and the exercise is repeated. Whatever they do, the lights only last for three months.
Believe me, since those four years ago, I continue to see that exercise every three months. After 50 years of Independence we cannot get street lights to work for more than twelve weeks. I saw live on television, men with machine guns killing each other at a junction where the street lights shone brightly during the civil war in Ukraine. I saw live on television last year, a huge riot in Buenos Aires where crowds hung banners on the street poles with the lamp lights shining brightly.
I spent my energy for years carping during the PPP’s reign about the non-functioning traffic signals. The PPP lost power ten months ago and the traffic signals still do not work. At the junction of UG Road and the Railway Embankment, the scene there is frightening. The signals for some mysterious reason go off at 6 p.m. Any schoolboy can tell you this is a traffic-crazy site. You have UG, Cyril Potter College, Gafoors Complex, Giftland Mall, Caricom Secretariat, Arthur Chung Convention Centre, Aquatic Centre, National Hardware housing estate, plus the construction of a cinema complex, Massy supermarket and the Specialty Hospital. If any junction needs traffic signals it this area. But they go dead after six in the evening. What an amazingly backward country.
The two photographs you see in this column paint a picture of a tragic 50-year-old sojourn. One is from a nightclub which wants waiters, barmen, security personnel, among other categories. The other is from a supermarket which requires a supervisor. Look at the image in both photos. We are a country of dark-complexioned Africans and Indians with a percentage of light-skinned people which is nowhere near being in the majority. Our European population here, even with an influx of Brazilians, is not even four percent. But the faces in those two placements are white men.
Make no mistake, the people who do these artwork are defiant about the white faces. Three well-known business establishments told me that they see nothing wrong with the Caucasian visage in their newspaper placements. The sociologist would refer to this as a reversion to colonial days. I would call it a journey into hell, where redemption is lost and will never be recovered. For the 50th anniversary, we should all wear the circus hat of the clown.
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