THE MORNING AFTER

May 27, 2016 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

There is a lovely tune that won the Academy Award for best song years ago. Titled, “The Morning After,” it was the theme song of the 1972 movie, “The Poseidon Adventure”, about a cruise ship that mirrored the disaster of the Titanic. The lyrics are very relevant to the coming days, months and years as we leave behind the swashbuckling celebrations of yesterday to mark the 50th year of Guyana’s Independence.
Then there is the 1986 Jane Fonda movie, “The Morning After.” After a night of ecstatic fun, she woke up in bed to find her lover dead right next to her with a knife in his chest. What have we woken up to after last’s night revelries and carnivals? Well one thing is sure, Guyana is not dead. There is no knife in its chest. But the knife is there waiting and in the morning after our celebrations, the knife needs to be broken up into pieces and thrown away so Guyana can live. The question is; has it not been living. The answer is yes and no.
The hours have moved on. May 26, 2016 is over; gone into the pages of history. Tomorrow, Guyana will still be here and most likely the people who celebrated the 50th anniversary yesterday. But as we remain Guyanese and hope for the best for this country, we can only help it if we face the nasty realities we saw in the morning after we woke up from our fun and frolic. We have lived with these realities for decades and we have to erase them from the face and body of Guyana.
How many of us have faced our ugly realities and with passion, purpose, decency, integrity, morality and objectivity, endeavoured to remove them so we can have a pleasant future for every Guyanese? The answer to that question is an unpleasant one. We vote for race and not issues. We condone undemocratic government because we prefer the party that is in power. We stay silent, as bureaucrats, central government and municipal governments, the police and private employers, violate our rights in inhuman ways. We stay silent as basic services that are easily given to humans in the rest of the world are denied to us.
We court our own personal destruction, because in our political support for the party in government the leadership takes us for granted, and by the time we realize it, an uncaring government has destroyed many of us and many parts of our country. The starting point for a new beginning should be the milestone of the 50th Independence anniversary. After 50 years of sovereignty, and with the fall of a viciously undemocratic regime in May 2015, every Guyanese in and out of this country should say; “This is the beginning of a dream.”
Will we speak those words? If I am asked, I would say the citizens’ attitude to the performance and deportment of the first year of Coalition power is a strong reason for a pessimistic prediction. Will another Independence anniversary, will another election date find us at the same cul-de-sac? The signs are opaque and gloomy.
Decades ago, we read about business people’s permits being held up by City Council. After hope was regained by the 2015 election results, we find the same nonsense. This time, it is not a PPP-controlled City Council directed by the Ministry of Local Government. But an APNU-AFC-dominated Council that reminds us so vividly that we haven’t moved much further down the road to paradise the past 50 years.
The Beharry Group of Companies has complained that its application to build its KFC outlet is stalled in the power cauldron of the Town Clerk’s office. Aren’t we ever going to move forward in this country? Yes, we can, but it takes courage from the people who just celebrated 50 years of sovereignty. Those people are not the politicians. Those people are us, the citizens. So we enjoyed our bacchanalian festivities on May 26, but in the morning after there are still people waiting for over six or eight hours to see a doctor at A&E at the Georgetown Hospital.
Yes, it was nice to bask in the glory of the May 26 festivities. Most people would agree that a country needs to observe in a big way that milestone. But in the morning after, we must not forget who we are – a poor county that needs to get better and more developed, and more modern, as we move towards another anniversary. We can only do that if we confront our backwardness, whether political, scientific or economic, and dedicate ourselves to bring a great future to this country.

1 thoughts on “THE MORNING AFTER”

Surujpaul Rampersaud May 27, 2016 at 3:42 pm

Wonderful Freddie. Remember the old Guyanese proverb” wha sweeten goat mouth does hut e belly”. Do you agree that the PR system is allowing for party and ethnic voting? There are many competent and patriotic Guyanese who are not party aligned and who have contributions to make. PR does not allow independents. If you agree, then use the forum you have to campaign for electoral system to be modified, part PR and part first past the post.