THE UNDENIABLE LEGACY OF THE CARIBBEAN’S MOST CONSEQUENTIAL JOURNALIST

Feb 20, 2022 Letters

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Dear Editor,

There is no journalist in the Caribbean whose columns evoke as much delight, satisfaction, controversy and criticism as Freddie Kissoon. These are the emotions that are contributing to making Mr. Kissoon legendary in journalism both in Guyana, and internationally. No other Guyanese has spoken out more about the five-month attempt to rig Guyana’s elections, or condemn the seemingly erosion of our way of life or the archaic way our establishment and companies chose to conduct businesses. The mere strokes of his pen will elicit agreement or great condemnation.
I will briefly reference several voicer letters to Kaieteur News in the past few days, that have direct inferences to Mr. Kissoon.
On 02-17, voicer Eric Phillips took great umbrage that Mr. Kissoon wrote the line “prepare to spend your time in Timbuktu”. Mr Kissoon correctly used Timbuktu in the context for which it is universally known….a faraway place. Mr. Phillips acknowledged that very few people are aware of the city’s location, but he still personally attacked Mr. Kissoon for allegedly painting a ‘false narrative’ of Timbuktu. Comically, he then used up nearly 60 lines to tell us what Mr. Kissoon already did, that…. “Timbuktu exists”!
Again on 02-17, former Finance Minister Winston Jordan wrote to implicitly threaten Mr. Kissoon for simply regurgitating what is commonly known….Mr. Jordan has been charged for misconduct. Interestingly, it appears that Mr. Jordan has singled out only Mr. Kissoon for his ire since others who have also referenced his legal challenges and have not been similarly threatened.
Also, on 02-17 a favourite target of Mr. Kissoon’s disgust has been the Guyana Human Rights Association. On 02-17, they validated every suspicion and criticism Mr. Kissoon has ever written about them. They wrote to express their disdain at Minister Dharamlall for his sexist comments in Parliament. They also attacked speaker Nadir for lacking courage for not disciplining Mr. Dharamlall. Yet, this purported “human rights’ body did not see the need to similarly criticise Sherod Duncan for his nightly outbursts against half of Guyana’s population calling them “wicked, evil, stink and dutty”, while using the most vile racial epithet “trench crapos”.
On 02-18, Mr. Edward Burrowes wrote a beautiful letter expressing his disagreement with Mr. Kissoon. He opined that Mr. Kissoon was unfair in stating that the PPP took care of Indians, and the PNC did not take care of Africans. He laboriously went on to articulate that while in power, the black government did not betray them but REALLY, REALLY took care of their black supporters. However, the PPP has not similarly taken care of their Indian supporters.
In sum, I respectfully believe that Mr. Burrowes misunderstood the true gist of Mr. Kissoon’s real argument, which is black leaders have generally become a ‘one trick pony.’ Their only concern is to feed their supporters lies about the last election while consistently attacking the ‘installed PPP, ‘ without offering true solutions to the black populace.
Finally, on 02-19 Mr. C Singh wrote “Why I stopped reading Freddie Kissoon.” He was especially unfair to Mr. Kissoon, in at least the following three ways: (a) Mr. Singh incorrectly wrote that Mr. Kissoon ‘criticised almost every aspect of President Granger’s tenure and overall leadership.” On the contrary, Mr. Kissoon was always restrained and respectful of Mr. Granger, repeatedly describing him as a ‘nice and decent man.” (b) Mr. Singh alleges that Mr. Kissoon hardly writes about matters of social significance. Readers of Mr. Kissoon are aware that he regularly pens columns condemning the pitfalls and social mores that plague Guyanese society. (c) Mr. Singh made up and embellished that “Mr. Eric Phillips had cause to correct Freddie Kissoon about a set of false information on Timbuktu which Mr. Kissoon used his column to peddle.”
In an attempt to impugn Mr. Kissoon’s credibility, Mr. Singh exposed his own.
Just in the past few weeks, there have been many other letters to this newspaper regarding Mr. Kissoon, including from Mr. Vincent Alexander, Mr. Vishnu Bisram, Mr. Hamilton Green and Ms. Isabelle de Caires. In addition, he has been mentioned numerous times on social media.
To the masses that make Kaieteur News Guyana’s most widely read newspaper, the letters and repartee about Mr. Kissoon offers great fodder and enjoyable reading.
One thing is certain about Freddie Kissoon’s friends, foes and critics….they will all be reading his column tomorrow morning!!

Respectfully submitted,
C. Persaud

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