2021 Review, Part 5: Things to internalise

Feb 17, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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This is the last part of the series though I must remind you as I did yesterday there was some confusion in the numbering process. Today’s article was supposed to be Part 6 but that has gone; published on February 7. Here now is the final reflection in the series of 6.
Guyana is such a complex, volcanically explosive land that the occurrences here, leave the analyst without energy to catch up with the events, the people and the places. 2021 was dominated by things we need to reflect on. When we do, our understanding of the country, which we live in, deepens.
No matter how disinterested you may be in what takes place in your country, you have to understand it if you are going to live in it. I start with a journey back to one year ago. In January last year, the Mayor and his deputy told me something that is taking place here that does not happen in the real world.
Their response to me came when I expressed confusion about why the City Council is still short of money when literally thousands (not hundreds) of expensive buildings have been constructed over the past 20 years in Georgetown. Hundreds of these structures are humongous buildings that would carry hefty annual rates and taxes.
The Mayor and his deputy told me that over 50 percent of these structures do not pay rates and taxes. Then that raises the question of insane inequalities in Guyana. My wife and I are pensioners. My only source of income is from Kaieteur News.
I go each year to pay rates and taxes and I see hundreds of ordinary folks lined up to pay their taxes. What levels of insanity exist in this place when hundreds of rich companies, and can spend billions in construction, then pay no rates and taxes to the city’s municipality. So why should vehicle-owners take out insurance? Why should people pay NIS? Really, is this a real country?
Last year was no different from previous years in the intellectual sterility of this nation. For the entire 2021, you pick up the papers, read the online news on Guyana, look at the local television interviews and you see how glaring the one-dimensional society we live in is.
All the analyses and opinions are directed at governmental behaviour. Governments are the most powerful institution in a nation but they are not the only source of power. In the US, all hell breaks loose when a movie actor or singer or famous sport personality makes a controversial remark. Why, because they are huge receptacles of influence.
People know that the remark will have tremendous spin-off in the society. You read the printed or online American newspapers and there are constant analyses on Amazon, Facebook and powerful billionaires. Here in Guyana, people seem to accept that only one source of influence is in existence – the government.
What happened in parliament before 2021 ended has no parallel in our history or our CARICOM neighbours. Unacceptable things have happened in the National Assembly before like pushing down law books or throwing down the Mace, etc. But what happened in December last year was incredibly sickening.
The Finance Minister was literally denied his right to make his presentation by Opposition MPs. The Speaker’s chair was surrounded by mob-like behaviour. Comically and dangerously, an opposition MP grabbed the Mace, ran with it and, much to the embarrassment of Guyana in the eyes of the world, fell flat on her backside while attempting to leave with the Mace. An opposition MP can be seen openly using racial vocabulary in an insulting way to a parliamentary employee protecting the Mace.
Here now is the most comically violent event in the history of Guyana’s parliament. After grabbing the Mace in the mistaken belief that only the presence of the Mace allows a Bill to be legally passed, the Opposition claimed that the Natural Resources Fund was not legally passed. So if you want to stop legislation from having legal imprimatur, then grab the Mace and throw it through the window. There was no flurry of press conferences by the plethora of amorphous “civil society” entities denouncing this outrage in Parliament.
In 2021, a group was formed with the name Article 13. Its purpose is to give effect to Article 13 of the constitution that allows for the participation of the citizenry. One of the men fighting for the success of Article 13 in that group was perhaps the most vociferous voice supporting the denial of the right to vote and have it counted in the March 2020 election. What the hell can he tell this nation about Article 13 and his colleagues in Article 13?
(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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