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CONSUMER CONCERNS…The jubilee celebrations and the Jagan-Burnham spontaneous embrace

May 22, 2016 News

PAT DIAL

The most important event in this month’s consumer calendar is the Golden Jubilee of National Independence commemoration and celebrations. It is also an event of importance to the whole nation.
This event allows us, as a nation, to pause and to take stock of our successes and failures, our achievements and missed opportunities over the past years. It allows us to look with a fresh mind and new perspectives and optimism upon the coming years.
The heart of the Jubilee commemoration and celebrations is on May 25 and May 26, especially in the evening when the flag-raising ceremony will take place and our leaders would be speaking to the Nation. This is a time of joy and togetherness, when with quiet and deep spontaneity we express our fundamental national oneness, transcending the various superficial differences we talk so much about.
The first Independence commemoration of 50 years ago which took place at the National Park expressed the same oneness of the Guyanese Nationality which young people would have an opportunity of experiencing and sharing on May26. The year 1966 was the culmination of a period of very bitter social and political conflict, the likes of which had never before occurred in Guyanese history and which the Nation will, fortunately, never again suffer.
But despite this ambience of tension and conflict at the time, the two national leaders, Dr Cheddi Jagan and Mr Forbes Burnham stood on the same podium. When the flag of Guyana was being raised, spontaneously and without their having any control of themselves, they embraced each other. The happening was so sudden and unexpected that there were no photographs of it. It symbolized the deep unity of Guyanese and Guyana, transcending all the differences about which we speak about so much.
This Jagan-Burnham spontaneous embrace is one of the most important and memorable symbols of Guyanese unity in the History of Guyana and we have often wondered why our Historians and other intellectuals have never given it the place of importance it deserves.
The Jubilee ceremonials will certainly recapture the essence of that moment of half-a-century ago, and all Guyanese, especially young people should savour it.
In the run-up to May 26, a large number of entertaining and educative functions and activities have been organized countrywide and there have been joyous participation everywhere. These include a series of performances by the best national artistes at the National Stadium and magnificent Fashion Shows at the Conference Centre.
At this time, many overseas Guyanese would be visiting their homeland and we should extend to them and to visitors from other countries the traditional hospitality and the hand of good fellowship and friendliness for which Guyanese people are known world-wide.
And it is apposite that we always remind ourselves that the Jubilee Celebrations have also resulted in many other positives in Guyanese Society as for example, the drainage of the Capital City has been immensely improved, mountains of garbage have been cleared, the illegal street sellers and their shanty stalls have been relocated so that proper town-planning could be effectuated.
Happy Jubilee to all!

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