Incredible revelations on Jagdeo at Lands Commission hearings

Oct 06, 2017 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I was scheduled to give testimony at 11.30 am on Wednesday morning at the Commission of Inquiry into ancestral African lands. But the testimonies went over their allotted time, so the Commission’s attorney asked me to be patient for there was one more witness before me. I sat at the back of the room with unnerving silence as a heart-broken woman described life in a tenth rate banana republic.
She had a large brown envelope from which emerged her documents. What you are about to read is real and it can only happen in a country that is a failed state. She described how President Jagdeo granted lease in Parika to a well known businessman who owns a very popular gas station as you travel from Houston to catch the Harbour Bridge.
Since the press is reporting on the enquiry, maybe the name of this businessman will be published but I am staying away from libel because people just sue because that is a ubiquitous habit in Guyana.
The lease overruns the property of this lady and she cannot get access to her land. So he did what citizens do in civilized societies – seek the intervention of the courts. On two separate occasions this lady got injunctions restraining this businessman from infringing on her land. The injunctions were ignored.
The man even built a huge tank further consolidating his usurpation of her land. She produced photographs of the tank. The nation heard about the state-owned well that Ramroop got from Jagdeo when he purchased Sanata Textile. This Jagdeo lease includes sea defence reserve which the Sea Defence Board granted.
She told the commission the name of the judges that granted the injunctions and she produced her documents. One of the Commissioners, Mrs. Khan asked her about application for contempt of court. She said that was done but the situation remains the same. What type of banana republic do we have in Guyana? The answer is a tenth rate one. Two injunctions are ignored and contempt of court writs are ignored.
I was so moved by that lady’s testimony that when it was my turn to take the stand, I asked the commission if I can include a fifth submission to the four I had to forward to the Commission’s secretariat before taking the stand. The fifth submission was to speak on what I heard in that lady’s testimony. The Commission agreed and I posed the question to them; do they have judicial power to summon that man and charge him with contempt of court? There was no answer from the commissioners but I did ask.
What went through the minds of the poorer folks who were in that room waiting to testify about their lands that were forcefully taken from them by oligarchs that were protected by the Jagdeo regime? I can tell you. They will feel that in Guyana injustice is so pervasive that the poorer classes will never receive justice in their country.
It is not that the lady is faking. She had her documents to prove that injunctions were granted and were ignored. She told the commissioners that the Chief Justice at the time even made the injunction permanent.
The people who heard and saw that lady on the stand will go on to tell their families and relatives of the lawless state that Guyana is. They in turn will tell their friends and the repetitions will pervade the low income classes. And what is born is a contempt that will run deep and wide for society. This in turn breeds cynicism and the climax is violence as we saw in two prison riots.
This society refuses to learn the lessons of history. When a country mistreats its less privileged citizens there will be an angry backlash.
What about the other dimension in this lady’s drama? The Bharrat Jagdeo input. No doubt Mr. Jagdeo knew the businessman on first name basis. This columnist is fully aware that Jagdeo knows this rich man very well. That explains the lease. A previous witness, Mr. Norman Dalrymple, of the Working People’s Alliance explained that lease land was also given to this particular rich gentleman on lands that are owned by the Cooperative Society of Vergenoegen. He explained that when co-op members went to assert their ownership, they were met by hooligans who unleashed violence on them
There must have been hundreds of oligarchs like that man to whom the presidencies of Jagdeo and Ramotar gave concessions. Jagdeo’s asinine sycophants that write letters in the press praising him as a master president may want to comment on Jagdeo also being a master dictator too.

1 thoughts on “Incredible revelations on Jagdeo at Lands Commission hearings”

Cochore October 6, 2017 at 6:49 am

In today’s S.N. Ramo headlined his letter to the editor..
“The years of the PPP/c in office were glorious.”
I say the falsity of such outlandish statements are laughable stupid even if it was a shamefully inglorious PPP fantasy.