I will never understand Guyana; can anyone?

Sep 21, 2017 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I read in the newspapers that the British Government will fund a project called waterfront recreation. It involves modernizing three waterfront sites to create aesthetic zones for citizens to enjoy. The areas are Vreed-en-Hoop Stelling, Stabroek River Front and the Georgetown Seawall from Kingston to Ogle. The Minister of Works (oops, Public Infrastructure; who changed the name?) said the plan was already in progress, funded by the State, when the British made the offer.
Here are extracts from my Friday, August 17, 2017 article, captioned, “A cruel neo-liberal government rules Guyana.” Basic infrastructure and essential services in this country have been primitive for a very long time; yet we will spend hundreds of millions of dollars on beautifying waterfront sites.
So my wife and I will go on the Vreed-en-Hoop Stelling, buy two fish burgers, look at the Demerara River in a romantic, nocturnal embrace then drive home where on the streets where I live in the dark, and we will die because there we will not see the roaming horses. I live at the junction of the Railway Embankment and UG Road where there are no street lamps that have been working for decades now.”
I went on to state and I suggest you pay careful attention to this quote; “The Alberttown Fire Station building is a disgrace. Kaieteur News carried a front page story where a house right next to the station was burnt to the ground. Please note; right next to the station. The Georgetown Hospital doesn’t have a tonopen to test eye pressure. It never had one; neither did the Ophthalmology Centre in Berbice.
Guyana unlike Barbados does not have facilities for DNA testing. Only private hospitals in Guyana do dialysis treatment; no public hospitals have the facilities.”
Here is another interesting section from that column; “The police force at the moment does not have even a third of the quota of speed guns that it needs. Ninety percent of the streets in the capital city do not have public lamps and that includes the continuation of Irving Street named J.B. Latchman Road that takes in the headquarters of the army.
“Not one public school in the entire territory of Guyana, and this includes Queen’s College, has consistently functioning washrooms. The technology labs at Guyana Technical Institute and at UG are bare. The National Library in an age of high technology does not offer computer service to its users.”
Well, there is more to add about this country’s backwardness. In speaking to the press after the daughter of former Deputy Commissioner of Police, George Vyphuis, was shot and robbed at Providence, Commander of ‘A’ Division, Marlon Chapman said that the Providence Police Station is without a vehicle.
Why was the government spending money on waterfront recreational facilities and the Providence Police Station does not have a vehicle? The British are funding the project but ask the British officials if their police stations are without vehicles. Ask them on which road you can find a police station that does not have street lamps. Ask them which major roadway in London is without street lights.
If the British Government is financing the aesthetic landscaping of water front sites in this country, can’t the Guyana administration put forward a proposal for use of that money on more pressing needs?
My lamentations on this country will continue because there seems to be no rational life in this land. Here is what happened to me yesterday. My daughter asked me to rush over quickly to the pharmacy at Giftland Mall to buy a specific type of medicated shampoo that she needed to use right away. My wife suggested we call first. I agreed. I would have to change, drive there only to be told they are out of stock.
I didn’t have a new telephone directory to get the number for the mall. I called enquiries at the telephone company. As I kept holding, every four seconds, a voice came on saying, “Please keep holding, your call is important to us.” I held for ten minutes and the operator didn’t come on.
I changed, went to the mall. They didn’t have the shampoo. I called the National Library to advise them to report the water leakage in front of the library entrance and to report it to GWI. I called the customer service department to report the water waste too. GWI water waste section said they never received a communication from the library or its own customer service section.
The water is still being wasted and undermining that part of Church Street. This is Guyana for you.

3 thoughts on “I will never understand Guyana; can anyone?”

RLSG September 21, 2017 at 11:54 am

Freddie you continue to highlight the stupidity and lack of foresight that is present in the brains of the current rulers. I always wonder what if any thought ever goes into some of the things they propose and accept for Guyana. I suppose in the bubble in which they live and exist (no taxes, free telephone, free water, free electricity etc) they have become jaded and exist only in their alternative universe and will never see the forest for the trees. For a group of highly educated people one is left to wonder what really do they see in the future for Guyana. And why build a bridge with three lanes .. why not four ? Has this group ever travelled overseas and seen how the rest of the world lives ? Makes one wonder sometimes !!!
1. rs dasai September 21, 2017 at 5:12 pm
  
  RL
  It is all rulers, not only the current ones.
Kassem_B September 21, 2017 at 4:06 pm

‘I will never understand Guyana; can anyone?’
Then I suggest you stop writing on Guyana especially the indo guyanese and ply your trade elsewhere