Reluctant voices, retired pens and the sad narrative in Guyana

Dec 20, 2018 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

As I approached the entrance to the church for the funeral service of Bevon Currie, a long time friend who was a vociferous critic of the PPP government, called me aside. In front of other mourners, he said, “I like what you wrote the other day about the traffic thing outside Parliament.”
I couldn’t dialogue because I was late for the service.
Those evangelical churches have long, long programmes, so I went outside to stretch my legs. He was still at the door. He brought up the traffic thing again. He said, “Freddie why they do it?” I know he is a mild supporter of the APNU+AFC regime so I replied, “Because they are bullies.”
This gentleman has been my friend a long time ago. His condemnatory words in the media during the reign of Jagdeo and Ramotar had echoes. But I don’t see any chastisements on the nonsense the present government is drowning in. I suspect he got caught up in the insanity of the asininity that surrounds Georgetown whenever Parliament is in session.
I don’t know what will happen tomorrow with the no-confidence vote. But if the ruling group is defeated and there has to be another general election and the grand coalition is the loser, then the insanity of asininity will disappear because I cannot see another government doing to this country what the present rulers has ordered in relation to the traffic chaos whenever Parliament meets.
As I drove home from Bevon’s funeral, the thought occurred to me that his intervention would add to the voices and pens of disgust over this traffic madness. But so many that were so willing to confront the PPP rulers have now put down their pen or put their voices in cold storage. Yet the mistakes, depravities, cruelties, stupidities, banalities, immoralities, negativities of the PPP cabals that so galvanized and stirred us to use our voices and pens are still present today.
The voices and pens were graphically visible during the bad days of the PPP because we didn’t like the nature of PPP’s rule. We didn’t like the PPP. They are invisible today because we support the party in power. We like those who govern the country. But is it people and race that should be the focus on how we judge governance or the essential nature of governance irrespective of the culture, ethnicity and looks of those who administer the state?
As life goes on each day in this country, and I see the same type of political deportment as when the PPP was in power, and I no longer hear the voices and pens that so exposed the debaucheries of the PPP, my mind’s concentration of power-sharing gets deeper.
I was at three wakes in recent days; those of Dr. Benjie Singh, Bevon Currie and the father of my friend, sports journalist, Rawle Welch. The sentiments of people who spoke to me poignantly revealed to me that this country is tragically divided along ethnic lines and unless the PPP and PNC have some accommodation among themselves in their control of state power, Indians in Guyana will not accept the PNC to govern Guyana; Africans will not tolerate a PPP government.
Sadly, the AFC could have been the catalyst for ethnic dissolution. They have betrayed this nation in ways that the PPP and PNC have never done. Sadly there seems to be no reincarnation of Walter Rodney. I guess the zeitgeist that produced Rodney, CLR James, Franz Fanon, Michael Manley, Maurice Bishop, Father Andrew Morrison and Martin Carter is gone.
It just pierced my soul that this gentleman at the church service whose pen and voice were so incisive when the PPP’s hegemony spread over Guyana cannot put his mind to write a little letter castigating the government for the sadistic arrangement they have ordered for the traffic in Georgetown.
What is fundamentally and essentially wrong with a party supporter telling his/her government that it has made a mistake and it should try strenuously not to repeat it?
Knowing the nature of the barbaric political culture we have in Guyana, Nagamootoo’s stupid reaction to Jagdeo’s request for a postponement of the no-confidence vote because of the Christmas season was expected.
Of course, Jagdeo should build on that political advantage when the insanity of asininity envelopes Georgetown tomorrow. He should tell the Guyanese people to blame Nagamootoo.
What is basically wrong with debating the motion in the first week in January in 2019? Nagamootoo said Jagdeo wanted it early so his request for a postponement is opportunistic. But no one anticipated it will be three days before Christmas.

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Reluctant voices, retired pens and the sad narrative in Guyana

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