The two GECOM lists and Jagdeo’s realpolitik

Jun 15, 2017 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

My deep feeling about the imbroglio with the GECOM chairmanship is that Jagdeo outsmarted Mr. Granger, and this is because either Mr. Granger was not getting finessed advice or his newness to politics is showing up.
Anyone who studied the evolution of the PPP would know that despite the mythologies that captured the imagination about Dr. Jagan from the fifties onwards, Dr. Jagan was more flair than substance, and did not have the commitment to people, places, friendships and philosophy as other leaders of his era did.
It is sad how Burnham got crucified on the altar of these mythologies, when the juxtaposition was made between him and Jagan. I would never accept that Jagan had the ugliness of authoritarian instincts that Burnham embodied. If Burnham did not start out that way, he surely ended up in that direction. My consistent adumbration is that those who admire and praise Burnham, will achieve intellectual acknowledgement from the world, if they can bring a more dispassionate assessment to Burnham rather than seeing him in one-dimension lenses, meaning that he was a great leader par excellence; he was not.
Maybe it is time that two of the most enduring admirers of Burnham – President Granger and Vincent Alexander – engage some of us in a public debate about Burnham’s politics. I once had such an online debate with Aubrey Norton. And just when it was getting elegantly objective, Aubrey stopped replying to the e-mail exchange which I still have.
The problem with Jagan is that his authoritarian instincts lay elsewhere, and he became just as intolerant as any other leader, but the process worked through his wife, Janet. So whereas Burnham would call you and say “you’re fired,” Jagan would let his wife do it, and he remained above reproach. For more on this aspect of Jagan’s character see the interview with the iconic Trinidadian, Lloyd Best in Frank Birbalsingh’s, “The People’s Progressive Party, 1950-1992: An Oral History”.
Cheddi and Janet Jagan moulded the PPP into a ruthless machine, and it has remained like that ever since. One of the most bestial acts of betrayal in world politics since the end of WW2 is Cheddi Jagan’s inhuman discard of the WPA after he became President. This was a party that sustained him in the ferocious days of Burnham’s descent in dictatorship, and the party that helped him to come to power.
History is not going to judge this man nicely at all. Whether it was Jagdeo or Luncheon or Ramkarran or Mrs. Jagan that was set to take power after Jagan died in 1997, the PPP, as a cunning organization obsessed with power, would have been the same. The sad thing about our politics is that the PPP and PNC are unchanging outfits. The AFC isn’t far behind them.
Desmond Hoyte became obsessed with removing Jagdeo, but his passion went back to some racist things he saw President Cheddi Jagan doing. For Hoyte, the PPP was a deadly force that he should not have negotiated with Jimmy Carter to allow it to come to power. The rest is history. All PPP leaders will play power politics. They will not cooperate with any aspect of this government’s agenda, no matter how nationalistic it is. This is not in the nature of the PPP.
We come now to the caption of this column. Jagdeo had no intention of handing Mr. Granger a list of professional, objective, good Guyanese. Granger was livid when he saw the first list. It was simply awful. The names, James Rose, Norman McLean, Ryhaan Shah was too much to take.
Jagdeo was playing realpolitik. But Mr. Granger couldn’t see that. Instead of telling Jagdeo; “you cannot be serious, these people will not be neutral and objective, these people will not bring integrity to the election process,” Mr. Granger went in a strange direction and cited constitutional requirements that were not there, and Jagdeo smiled.
Those who supported Granger, egged him on by assuring him he was right that “any other fit and proper person” also means the person has to be a judge or former judge. Jagdeo was winning the chess game.
Jagdeo submitted another unacceptable list, and Mr. Granger added more fictional constitutional requirements that no one has ever heard about. He laid down a list of criteria that the names must meet. Again Jagdeo won out. All Mr. Granger had to say was that; “I want persons that are politically neutral and I don’t believe these people will be.”
So Jagdeo will submit a third list. My prediction is that this one will be more unacceptable than the first two.

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