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What happened should never happen again in the world

Aug 03, 2020 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I have typed this column exactly five months after the March 2, 2020 elections. Exactly five months after the election there has now been the official swearing in of the winning president, Dr. Irfaan Ali. What happened in Guyana should never be repeated in another country. Those who carried Guyana through these bestial journeys should not be forgiven.
It is not that we had a close election and therefore logical clarifications were needed over a day or two. It is not that there were some imbroglios on voting day that needed to be dissolved in a few days’ time.
Even the most gifted poet and the most brilliant user of prose will be hard pressed to describe the election depravity that has been creating tsunamic, acidic waves over Guyana.
I saw parties win and lose elections in my country since 1992 and no one in this entire world could have convinced me that after 2015 from what I saw unfolding after the APNU+AFC came to power in 2015 that it was not planning a crooked election. All the moves, some subtle, some not so subtle were there to create the final curtain.
It happened on March 4 and we ended up in a ravenous jungle where morality, conscience and humanity got lost. It should never happen again to any nation, to any other group of citizens. It has finally concluded with the swearing in of Irfaan Ali as president right next door to my home at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre ACCC).
As the nation moves on with its collective life, as the nation picks up the pieces of its collective life, we must never forget, and we must always remember why the rigged election failed even though the riggers took five months to perpetrate its fraudulent drama.
I am typing this column, periodically looking through the window right next to my desk from which I can see the courtyard of the ACCC as the cars drive in for the swearing in of Dr. Ali and I am thinking of the persons who made this possible.
I repeat for the umpteen time, they are: Bruce Golding, Owen Arthur, American Ambassador Sarah-Ann Lynch; Canadian High Commission, Lilian Chatterjee; British High Commissioner Greg Quinn and EU Ambassador Fernando Ponz Cantó. I repeat for the umpteen time, the government of President Ali, must make a bust of these people to be displayed in one of the most prominent parts of this country.
If it weren’t for these democratic souls, then on March 14, David Granger would have been sworn in as president and from thereon, this country would never have seen another free and fair national election. For generation to come, the people of this country would have known only one party controlling the government.
We have been saved and, unfortunately, Arthur was not with the Guyanese people yesterday as Guyana celebrated a new lease on life, a life he helped to sustain. We must never forget this former Prime Minister of Barbados who refused to play the ugly game of seeing the world through the eyes of race and judging civilized values on the basis of race.
I have a young daughter and I will ask her to put up a large photograph of Arthur on her bedroom door on which hang other heroes, like Mandela, Malala and others who stood up for justice and principles in the world.
When I secure that image, I will hang one too on my bedroom wall. Life can be harsh at times. Arthur had to die just a week before what he helped Guyanese to achieve has seen the apogee at the ACCC yesterday.
In any analysis of the circumstances that took us to that apogee, the role of the fine legal, independent minds of Guyana’s judicial system from High Court to Court of Appeal to Caribbean Court of Justice must be highlighted. We don’t have a president from a cheated election because Chief Justice, Roxane George-Wiltshire ruled in the first week of March that Clairmont Mingo must follow the law in tabulating of the Region 4 votes. That injunction stopped the swearing in of Granger on March 14.
Then there were Court of Appeal judges, Dawn Gregory and Brassington Reynolds. The PNC leaders agreed with the suggestion of the Barbadian Prime Minister, Mia Mottley to solve the election impasse by having a recount. Had the recount been ruled illegal, Granger would have long been sworn in. Guyana has survived because of these great folks.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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