African Guyanese must ask moral questions about these people 

Aug 30, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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Kaieteur News – In 2022, 14 years after his exit from government, Dr. Henry Jeffrey explained last Sunday the circumstances that led to his departure from the PPP government in 2008. Mr. Jeffrey is part of a broad anti-government thrust that argues that the PPP government rigs elections and the PPP is discriminating against African Guyanese.

Last Sunday marks the first time, Jeffrey has spoken in detail on the reason he and the government parted ways in 2008. I will ask African Guyanese to read carefully what Jeffrey wrote and reflect on the advocacy of certain African Guyanese who purport to speak on their behalf.

In a commentary titled: “Jagdeo’s Legacy,” here are the words of Jeffrey himself: “The president and I finally fell out over the position he took on the Caricom/European Union Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA). In December 2008, after the press got wind of my resignation from the PPP/C government as of the 31st December, 2008, they began to bombard me with suggestions that I was sacked. I explained that I was required to resign from the government and was offered the position as ambassador to Suriname. I said I would think about. This I did, made some requests that were rejected and so did not accept the position.”

Anyone with commonsense, not education, can understand those words. Nothing about them is complicated. Everything about them is simple to grasp. Here is an explanation of what that quote means. As Minister of International Trade, Jeffrey got into a disagreement with President Jagdeo and after he left Cabinet, he was offered the post of ambassador to Suriname.

In Jeffrey’s own words, he could have stayed on but his requests on the appointment to Suriname were rejected. He did not state what the requests were. I know what the requests were. It was about financial conditions. To conclude, Jeffrey had a one-dimensional reason for not remaining in a state job in the government of President Jagdeo – disagreement on the Suriname posting. Jeffrey in his article made that plain and included no other reason.

Now read on what Jeffrey wrote in his condemnation of Jagdeo in his article cited above. Now as you digest the quote that is coming up, bear in mind Jeffrey spent 16 years serving under four PPP presidents – Cheddi Jagan, Janet Jagan, Sam Hinds and Bharrat Jagdeo.

Bear in mind that Jeffery was a minister during the period 2002 and 2007 when the mayhem and violent insanity took over Buxton. Bear in mind that all African related organisations including the PNC, ACDA, WPA, Cuffy 250, IDPADA-G, Overseas Friends of the WPA, the Trade Union Council, have accused the PPP government of murdering over 400 African males as part of extra-judicial operations during the period 2002 -2007.

Here is Jeffrey once more: “He (Bharrat Jagdeo) came to the presidency in 1999 and between then and 2005, Guyana’s economy stagnated. During his tenure, over 400 Guyanese lost their lives as he and the other PPP oligarchs tried to establish ethnic dominance in Guyana.”

Let’s resort to commonsense once more. During the time the PPP government was killing 400 Guyanese and was trying to achieve racial hegemony, Jeffrey was a senior Cabinet minister. But what could have been a sounder moral basis for leaving the Cabinet than a government killing people en mass (400) and as a Black Guyanese Minister watching ethnic domination against Africans?

Let’s offer one final quote from Jeffrey’s article titled, “Jagdeo’s Legacy.” He writes, “Jagdeo after decades in the top political leadership role… according to an International Republican Institution (sic) study supported by his government, only about 22% of the Guyanese believe that the PPP government is democratic.”

This is interesting stuff that has destroyed Jeffrey’s credibility. He quotes the International Republican Institute (IRI). Obviously, he finds the report credible. But the very organisation accepted the results of the 2020 election as free and legitimate. The very Jeffrey picks and chooses which reports he will accept.

But Jeffrey is not alone in this picking and choosing business. The gamut of anti-PPP propagandists does not recognise the reports of any international organisation that designated the March 2020 election free and fair. They do not recognise any voice other than the PNC’s that cries out that the PPP rigged the March poll. We await Jeffrey’s explanation why he stayed in the government when 400 killings took place.

Let’s end with hilarity, PNC parliamentarian, Ganesh Mahipaul appeared on the Gildarie-Freddie Kissoon Show and said he is not familiar with what Dominic Gaskin, the son-in-law of then President Granger, said about the elections. I don’t think Mahipaul or Jeffrey know who Gaskin is. Funny! Very funny!

(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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