At times, I feel sorry for rural East Indians

Jul 02, 2016 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Here is a brief quote from a letter in yesterday’s Kaieteur News from Mr. Hydar Ally, who is one of the longest serving members of the PPP. He currently holds the position of Secretary of the Executive Committee, the highest policy-making body of the PPP; “It is no secret that the University Council is made up of several persons who enjoyed the confidence of the political directorate and who influence the decision making process in a way acceptable to the party in power.
“Several qualified and distinguished individuals were denied employment during the days when the UG Council was dominated by known PNC members and supporters. Among those was the late Dr. Walter Rodney who was denied a teaching job at the University of Guyana by the PNC dominated Council.”
Any stranger unfamiliar with Guyana would not know, after reading Mr. Ally’s letter, that the very party of Mr. Hydar Ally ran the government of this country for 23 years which would have given it 23 years of domination of the university. The very Ally himself represented the PPP on the UG Council for 12 years. When you compare the PNC Government’s control of UG from 1964 to 1992 and the PPP’s from 1992 to 2015, the comparison is like a serial killer and a pick pocket.
During the reign of the Forbes Burnham Government, there wasn’t a sitting PNC Parliamentarian on the Council of the University. There wasn’t a sitting Parliamentarian from the PNC on the Council of the University during the presidency of Desmond Hoyte.
In 1995, the Cheddi Jagan Government amended the University of Guyana Act and created enormous scope on the Council for PPP’s hegemony at the university. The Council was now made up of representatives from various stakeholders all of whom were selected by the PPP. During my time on the Council, representing the union, there were five PPP Parliamentarians and eight card-bearing members of the PPP.
Gail Teixeira became the marshal of the PPP troops on the Council and literally ran the University along with her fellow PPP Parliamentarian, Bibi Shadick, after there was a hiatus between the refusal to renew Professor Lawrence Carrrington’s contract and the installation of a new Vice-Chancellor
In two General Elections, the Vice-Chancellor of the university ran as an election candidate for the ruling PPP. Dr. James Rose was on the PPP list of candidates for both the 2001 and 2006 General Elections. There is no way, President Burnham and Hoyte would have allowed that. Such a vulgarity would be unthinkable in the Caricom countries.
President Jagdeo’s press liaison, Dr. Prem Misir, was appointed Pro-Chancellor of the university. And in 2013, the very PPP-dominated Council made PPP Bibi Shadick, the Pro-Chancellor.
I remember writing a letter in the press, as a reaction to this appointment, with the opinion that this was the final PPP insult to this nation. A 10th rate lawyer who has no higher qualifications and who never functioned in academia, Ms. Shadick was made the boss of the Council in the absence of the Vice-Chancellor, Lawrence Carrington.
At the moment, we have the comical situation that only a comical country like Guyana can produce. Ms. Shadick is the PPP representative on the Guyana Elections Commission and she remains Pro-Chancellor of the University of Guyana. What a tenth rate, banana republic this county is.
It is the poor rural folks who will bear the brunt of these indecencies, vulgarities and semantic diseases of PPP leaders like Hydar Ally. At the bottom house meetings, the contents of Ally’s morbid fictions will be gospel. The rural Indians will walk away from these meetings thinking it was only the PNC Government that interfered with UG and their state institutions, not ever knowing that their own party’s dictatorship made the PNC’s reign look like child’s play.
The most horribly shocking thing about Hydar Ally’s letter was that it was written by a PPP leader who spent twelve years on the University Council and whose essential task on the Council was to ensure PPP’s control of the university.
My mother use to say something long before Walter Rodney wore long pants. She would say she doesn’t understand why God would not choke people when the lying words come out their mouths. Decades after I heard my mom said that, Walter Rodney mentioned a similar sentiment about oppressive politicians that fool their citizens. Where was God when Hydar Ally’s fingers were moving on the keyboard as he typed his vile, dirty, yellow letter? Why didn’t God cause his fingers to go bent?

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At times, I feel sorry for rural East Indians

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