President Granger misses some essential points about copying

May 08, 2016 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

It is simply incomprehensible how European countries devastated by war and hunger after 1945 could have developed themselves that today they send money to post-colonial countries who didn’t even suffer five percent of physical destruction that WW2 brought to Europe.
Hamburg was destroyed with over 50,000 deaths and a million refugees. In the history of warfare no city has ever been more cruelly bombed as Dresden. Dresden became a complete ruin in 1945. Hamburg and Dresden are not just ordinary cities in 2016; they are post-modern places; so is the country they are part of – Germany. Germany has the soundest economy in the world after China. Germany is the centre of the European Union.
Today, post-colonial leaders and intellectuals continue to frown upon the former colonial powers and other developed states, blaming them for every social and political ill that has befallen the Third World. But we don’t blame ourselves. We cannot perform, so we have to explain our primitive condition to our population. So we find the perfect excuse; not just an excuse but the perfect alibi – the Whiteman did us in. Yes the Whiteman did us in. He colonized us, took our resources and interfered with our psyche. But after 50 years, we refuse to learn life’s lessons.
The Whiteman colonized us and imposed ancient laws and regulations on us. Then the Whiteman withdrew from our lands and left us to develop our territories all by ourselves. Then time passed and the Whiteman changed with time, but we are still stuck in the past. The Whiteman’s own ancient laws he, himself, has done away with long, long ago. But though we are happy to perennially cuss him down, we love the ancient habits the Whiteman instilled in us. We worship the irrelevant customs the Whiteman brought and that the Whiteman himself now finds outdated.
President Granger asserted that there is no priority on the Government’s agenda for changing the laws relating to marijuana. In justifying his position, he is quoted as saying that we should be careful what we copy from the developed world. I would like to know what the things are that we should be careful not to copy and what are the things we should copy. But just as we should be wary of copying from the developed world, should we not become fed up with the aid we have been asking for and they have been giving us since they withdrew from our lands more than fifty years ago?
Is it right for European countries that were devastated in WW2 to be sending funds to the post-colonial world year in year out since Independence? Why should German money come to the Third World when at the end of 1945, many post-colonial societies were far better off than Germany? Shouldn’t some Third World countries be sending aid to Germany?
There are some points Mr. Granger missed about the changing world we live in. Which country jails people for the possession of a smoking utensil? I don’t know the answer, but I can tell you I doubt whether any European country, including the post-communist ones in Eastern Europe, has such a law. I can tell you that Canada and the US do not jail people for possession of a smoking utensil. I haven’t done the research, but it is my belief that there is no law in the developed world in which a person can be charged for the mere possession of a smoking utensil. But let us say I am wrong, I am betting everything I have that if charged there will not be an automatic jail sentence
There is another point President Granger missed when he advised us to be careful how and what we copy from the West. President Hoyte did not only copy his anti-narcotic law from the West; it was imposed on him. Maybe we should undo our copying from the developed world by abolishing President’s Hoyte shameless copy of the drug law from the developed world.
Finally, are there things we should copy from the developed world? The list is limitless. Had the Third World done that earlier in their Independence years, maybe they would have been better countries. We should import the anger of their youths who are willing and eager to fight against wrong-doing. We should emulate their social services. In Germany, university education is free. In Scandinavia there are public swimming pools. We have four in Guyana but not one is open to the public. We should copy the moral obligation mentality of their leaders who resign when they commit wrong-doing. Joe Harmon is still in office. I could go on, but why waste my time.

1 thoughts on “President Granger misses some essential points about copying”

Surujpaul Rampersaud May 8, 2016 at 12:04 pm

Thanks again Freddie. You are hitting the nail on the head. Our politicians are just feeding us with rhetoric. The president should have offered more clarity in that there are lots of positive things we can learn from the west. You have highlighted some of these. There is much more.