The talented Mr. Duncan

Sep 13, 2018 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I knew Sherod Duncan when he was a student at UG while I was a lecturer there. Mr. Duncan published some nice sentiments about me in a letter to the press in which he voiced his admiration for my human rights contributions.
But in an interview with him in March this year, at the end of our conversation, it was clear to me that my human rights work had no influence on Duncan. The incident was the removal of David Hinds and Lincoln Lewis as columnists with the Chronicle. Duncan voted for the ouster of the two men. As we spoke for about fifteen minutes (which exhausted my cell phone credit), I tried in vain to impress upon Duncan two salient values contextual to Guyanese society.
One was that these two men are no ordinary activists who arrived overnight but icons in the Guyanese society who fought for the freedom of independent minds to write in the Chronicle. The second impression I heaped on Duncan was that given the status of these two men, the editor should not make that decision by himself.
While listening, Duncan kept repeating these words, “I hear your wisdom; I hear your wisdom.” At the end our chat, my wisdom meant absolutely nothing to Duncan. In a mild tone, quite the opposite to mine, Duncan told me that he voted to uphold the right of the editor to make the decision. After that angle, a long lecture followed during which I took Duncan to Nazi Germany and the Nazis’ legal right to kill people.
I reminded him of his endless condemnations of the Town Clerk, Royston King, for doing wrong things and pointed out to him that though King had the right to make egregious decisions, he Duncan was critical of King because of the output of those edicts. No lecture or words of wisdom mattered to Duncan in that exchange.
It was clear to me I was speaking to an opportunist. There is an American film with a tragic theme that was a worldwide success named, “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” based on the 1955 novel of the same name. It is the story of an opportunist who conspiratorially exploited every situation he found himself to get what he always wanted for himself. One of the themes of that novel/movie can be applied to the talented Mr. Duncan.
Duncan used the morbid nonsense that took place in the Georgetown City Council to achieve the fame of a democratic fighter. The horrible parking meter contract was a fertile bed. He got national recognition, and it was time, like Mr. Ripley, to get what he wanted. He found it in the Alliance For Change. He secured it in Moses Nagamootoo. The apex came with the GM position at the Chronicle.
Maybe Duncan saw the Ripley movie. In it the opportunist gets his way. He goes on with his life. Unfortunately, for Duncan, the Guyanese movie he starred in has a different ending. Maybe we are seeing the end of the political career of the talented Mr. Duncan. It is doubtful he can win a constituency seat for the AFC even if the AFC nominates him. It probably will because the AFC is in a desperate situation; it needs all the faces it can get to contest the local government elections in November.
If it doesn’t, he may move to APNU. The problem Duncan will find should he gravitate to APNU is that the party is not short of faces and may have no place for him. Of course the Chronicle money mess now constitutes baggage for the talented Mr. Duncan. Young cadres in the PNC will ask themselves why should someone like Duncan hop over and be rewarded with a City Council seat.
The future doesn’t look good for the talented Mr. Duncan but the imbroglio he found himself in is typical of this country. So many in the top of the AFC pyramid and in APNU’s hierarchy, rose to power and authority because of the venalities, depravities and immoralities of the Jagdeo/Ramotar hegemony over Guyana. In office, APNU+AFC put people who were not schooled in the art of democracy and possessed of the finer instinct of justice.
The extravagant spending Duncan is accused of and his alleged role in firing the finance director is not an isolated case. Since 2015 many of the public sector new faces of the APNU+AFC regime are on a spending binge. If you think Duncan’s $5 million bill is large then you should see the figure for UG. It is my opinion that you will not survive a heart attack or apoplexy when you see the figures.