Osafo lives on a road named after Quamina

Mar 10, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Kaieteur News – The symbols of the betrayal of Black people by the APNU+AFC regime are everywhere. For those who understood how Black people were betrayed after 2015, they must explain to African Guyanese the politics of psychological exploitation.
Osafo is an African name. He lives in Beterverwagting on a road named after the great slave rebel, Quamina. Osafo was spared a jail term by a coat of varnish recently. He didn’t smoke ganja. He was found guilty of having four marijuana plants. He was fined. But he could have been jailed. Shem Winter another Black youth wasn’t so lucky. He got three years for 16 grams.
How did Osafo and Winter vote in the last general election? How do Osafo and Winter feel about what happened in Region Five in Cotton Tree last year? After two cousins were murdered, PNC leaders went up to the region and addressed a gathering of African Guyanese. Their address led to widespread occurrences of violent attacks against Indians.
Was Osafo betrayed when he was charged for possession of four ganja plants? To answer that question one has to go back to 2015 and 2016. On the campaign trail, both APNU and AFC promised legislation, long overdue, to amend the law that relates to narcotics. The world was frowning on people being imprisoned for smoking a joint or having a few grams.
In 2016, Nigel Hughes drafted the amendment that would have made changes to the law of which two were long overdue – bail would be available for possession of small amounts, and there would not be mandatory prison on conviction. The Bill was put on the Parliamentary Order Paper to be debated in the name of AFC’s parliamentarian, Michael Carrington. The Bill was taken off the Order Paper and died there and then.
From 2016 to this very day, no third, second or first level PNC leader has ever told the nation why the Carrington Bill was shelved. It is incredible in any country that no journalist has ever asked the question to any PNC leader why the amendment was never debated even though the PPP Opposition in the House agreed to support the Bill. Now in 2022, the PNC and the AFC are still interested in the changes.
In what must be the most graphic evidence in the history of this county, there are politicians that are unfit to represent the citizens that voted for them, APNU and AFC tabled in parliament under the name of Sherod Duncan, a more expansive amendment to the Carrington Bill in 2021.
How can any human watch this acidic contempt their party leaders have for them yet offer them their embrace? Two repellant dimensions of the 2021 amendment need highlighting. One is that basic human decency should have forced the leaders of APNU+AFC to offer both an explanation and apology for why the Bill died when they were in power.
The loss of the no-confidence motion was not the answer. That occurred at the beginning of 2019. The Carrington Bill was on the Order Table in 2016. The second dimension is that Black leaders’ contempt for African Guyanese youths is deep, extensive and ubiquitous. When these Black leaders had power to change the marijuana law, they did not. But they saw nothing sickening in introducing the amendment when they were no longer in government and control of parliament.
I saw a video of an AFC parliamentarian shouting frenetically as he described the PPP leaders as hypocrites. He kept yelling for almost two minutes – “hypocrites, hypocrites, hypocrites!” Someone from the PPP should have done a counter video showing APNU+AFC parliamentarians speaking in Parliament about their marijuana amendment with an image of the guillotined Carrington Bill of 2016 in the background shouting like the AFC MP, “hypocrites, hypocrites, hypocrites!”
Osafo was spared and is free to do his thing but I would like to speak to people like him. I would like to go into the mind of Osafo to understand how he thinks about Black leaders who he voted for, assuming that he voted for the PNC. But even if he didn’t, I would still like to gauge his thinking on the failed Carrington Bill. Did he think the PNC betrayed Black youths? How does he feel about the attitude of a certain PNC lawyer when a Black youth, Keifer Burnett was arrested by the Kitty police for two grams of ganja? (See my column of Tuesday, January 8, 2019, “African Guyanese 52 years after Independence.”) If Osafo is reading this, then give me a call on 614-5927 and I will publish our chat on this page.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

Latest News

Osafo lives on a road named after Quamina

Related

Similar Articles

The Glenn Lall Show | January, 10th, 2025

Follow on Tik Tok @Glennlall

THE BLUNT OF THE DAY

Sports

National basketball team down to 15 after intense trials

Terrence Ali National Open schedule to fist off...

Foreign Link players call for Darts Association...

Race for GFF Elite League qualification narrows...

BCB organize practice session for female...

Archery Guyana makes history with Physiotherapist...

Features/Columnists

Members of the National Assembly should exercise civility towards their peers

Clarifying misconceptions about the Panama Canal

Renegotiation – working with and within, the contract

Publisher’s Note

Weekend Cartoon

Bridge Watch

Demerara Harbour Bridge

> Berbice Bridge […]

Osafo lives on a road named after Quamina

Share this:

Related

Similar Articles

The Glenn Lall Show | January, 10th, 2025

Follow on Tik Tok @Glennlall

THE BLUNT OF THE DAY

Sports

Features/Columnists

Publisher’s Note

Weekend Cartoon

Bridge Watch

Demerara Harbour Bridge

> Berbice Bridge […]