Use this criterion to judge the PPP, PNC and AFC

Dec 04, 2019 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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My favourite foreign newspaper is the Guardian of the UK. It is independent, liberal and certainly suspicious of the power establishment. I am not a fan of the New York liberal media establishment. It is riveted with contempt for Third World peoples, their cultures and histories.
You can see the Freudian mind at work in some of the Guardian’s review of arts, literature and entertainment. If the Guardian’s journalists come down to Guyana, the same stereotypical assessment will be made as those of racist, biased Caucasian journalists from Europe and the US.
A country like Guyana will never be given even a D grade by visiting journalists from the developed world. The question is after knowing this why then do Guyanese leaders give these people ammunition that reinforces their stereotypical thinking of us?
From the Jagdeo government right up to the present time, you see a certain shocking absence of elementary thinking in the heads and minds of our rulers.
Guyana does not have an opera house, eight-lane highways, and shipyards. Guyana does not manufacture industrial goods. Foreign journalists will run down Guyana for the absence of these things and there is nothing Guyana can do about it. We don’t need those things anyway.
But there are things we can do to prevent the world from accepting that we are an uncivilized dump. Each night, without exception, I see a portrait of these leaders that remind me how tragic this land is and may remain an enduring tragedy (I honestly don’t see Guyana continuing as a viable state and nation 50 years from now, oil or no oil).
I am referring once more to streetlights. The leadership of this country from Jagdeo’s presidency to David Granger allows unnecessarily, the world to think we are a medieval wasteland.
From Jagdeo’s era onwards, there must have been thousands of small and large American, European, Canadian and Asian investors who have visited this land. I believe 99.99 percent of them did not travel on the streets in Charlestown, those in the housing schemes south of Princess Street, the roadways at the back of, Enmore, Mahaica, Mahaicony, etc.
I believe 99.99 percent of these visitors have travelled on the Rupert Craig Highway and its continuation way into the East Coast and the Railway Embankment. Over the last ten years, the Railway Embankment has witnessed a proliferation of structures.
Here are some – Caricom Annexe, Giftland Mall, Movietowne Complex, Aquatic Centre, Amerindian Hostel, Demerara Housing Estate, Rama Krishna central church, the expansion of the Correia airport with the arrival of international flights.
In close proximity to the Embankment are the US Ambassador’s residence, Gafoor’s gated community, the UN envoy to Guyana. University Garden sits on the Railway Embankment.
Several foreign diplomats live there. At the moment, there are four constructions currently taking place right on the Railway Embankment that includes a primary and secondary school.
I see long stretches of vehicles each night outside my home (directly opposite Movietowne). I would say the area that has the fastest construction of physical structures in Guyana is the junction from Sheriff Street to Ogle on the Railway Embankment.
Why then with such an expanding section of Guyana, the leadership of the government would have this place without functioning street bulbs for over ten years?
I say in all honesty, how could a thinking human vote either for the PPP or APNU+AFC when they encouraged and are encouraging outsiders to run us down with their incompetent leadership? Here is an area of Georgetown where 99.99 percent of foreign investors have to pass yet simple streetlights cannot be fixed.
Any nationalist leader must know that it is has be an area of priority because foreigners will go back and say that right in the heart of the investment environment, you drive on streets darker than the black lagoon. Why would any government want to have that state of affairs existing for over ten years?
Is it deliberate? In my opinion, yes. I don’t think the people in Government that administer this country, (before and at present), could be bothered with the Rupert Craig Highway and the Railway Embankment not having streetlights and functioning traffic signals.
These people are not interested in Guyana, only in having power. Each Monday evening, the leadership of the AFC congregates for their statutory meetings. Go and see for yourself, the vehicles these people arrive in.
Both female ministers of the AFC have their drivers open the car door for them to exit and go in. I told Minister Garrido-Lowe that I find such conduct is unbecoming. She looked at me with vacant eyes and remained unmoved.

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