No hope-despair and decadence confront us

Oct 07, 2022 Letters

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Dear Editor,

The interminable, plaintive and useless cry of 90 percent of Guyanese were captured in the column, ‘The post-office: Keep complaining and people will be helped,’ penned by Freddie Kissoon, on Oct 03, 2022. This takes me back to September 21, 2022, when in ‘Noise Change will come – it will worsen,’ which was a response to the letter, ‘Land of the Cacophonous,’ alluded to by Shamshun Mohamed in his September 19, 2022 one, ‘DPP getting serious with noise nuisance.’ Thus, I am compelled to make comments.

Shamshun, like Freddie, is hoping in vain, that Guyana will change for the better, where ‘certain illegalities’ have been endorsed by the forces that be. Since much has been said (in vain too), about noise and traffic, two permanent cultural, self-perpetuating depravities, initiating succeeding generations into ‘loudness of music’ and wildness of driving,’ I will only comment on the nature of basic services in Guyana.

Freddie Kissoon’s woes are replicated daily across all Guyana, barring a few places and only occasionally. But for first, let me share my encounter with the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA) in Brickdam.

Editor, it took me a total of eight years to get a house lot, in this land of underused and under populated Guyana. When the new Government took office in August 2020, I was hopeful of some kind of redress to accommodate backlogging. Maybe that was so, and I was ‘missed’ or was being waited upon to do ‘the norm,’ which meant a nepotistic or venal route. In the end, I managed the first, through a kind ally of the ‘forces that be.’ As expected, I was elated and immediately proceeded to pay the required deposit. To make a long story short, it took me five hours to accomplish the feat. I had to go to the bank and endure the ordeal to ‘withdrawing my own money.’ Then, in fright, I traversed to Brickdam, joined three separate lines, and ultimately made my payment.

This is the ‘much vaunted and boast-about’ modern Guyana. Ask any few of the many visitors, here over the last few weeks, if they have to subject themselves to anything remotely close to this. In the digital age, characterising the modern world, businesses and monetary transactions are expedited in a ‘few minutes of spare time,’ from an everyday gadget, even on the roadside or while waiting in a car. I propose for debate that “Guyana is in a hole; it will never catch up.”

Freddie’s General Post Office (GPO), downtown, will never change. It is quintessential Guyana. Lodged in the psyche of Guyana’s leaders and citizens is a fossilized and impervious psyche. For example, when there are the building and resurfacing of roads, in Guyana, the norm in the developed world, here, they make for repeated and national headlines. Plus, whenever a new road is built, there is no talk about the depth; Guyanese only hear about the length. But we rejoice, as our minds have been conditioned to see ‘rights’ and ‘norms’ as huge blessings and signs of development.

Will change come? You tell me. But for now, my second comment, here is another ‘illegal norm.’

Annandale North Market Road, on the western side, between Narine and Ramsingh streets, there is a twin-lot junk yard. The twin lot is an impediment to daily living for marketers, pedestrians and drivers. Vehicles, on business at the junk yard, encroach onto the Market Road, making life difficult, especially when students from Annandale Secondary are going to and from school. Run-down snack stands accommodate buyers in vehicles, so that even walking is affected. This junk yard has junk in an empty lot that is now over-filled. Then on the road, the actual Ramsingh street, heading west, the space leading to the drain is filled with the junk, or we can say, old pieces of vehicles. This is because the owner sees this as the norm. He has overfilled his pavement, all around his fence, and so the actual road is the next step.

And why not? Afterall, having such a business at that location is okay. So, the rest- blocking the road, encroaching the side walk, and burning debris, etc., all followed suit. Such practices are widespread. The President and his Vice, as well as the Attorney General, all know this. In fact, the President and his AG made a regal visit to this village not too long ago. And they had to see this morass, to which I add a few more ‘entrenched and endorsed illegalities’- the mechanic who has abandoned vehicles on Big Dam, leading to the high school, the Saturday and Sunday vendors at the entrance from Main Road (Leading into the Market Road), the ‘car park’ on the two sides of the road just mentioned, and I can go ‘on and on.’ In fact, even as I write on this Wednesday, the Monday garbage pick-up never occurred. This village too epitomizes Guyana.

I mean, a Presidential entourage came, saw the shambles, gorged (duck-curry-curried duck?) and over all, had a ball with the people, then left to ‘live happily ever after.’ What is the net effect? No change. I recall the Village Council for the area (housed at the run-down Lusignan Community Centre  ground) doing the routine scooping of the drains in Annandale, and guess what? The refuse, comprising scum, sewage, slime, sludge, and swill, was left at the two side of the road. What has not been washed down by the rain and pressed down by wide vehicles, is there. It will remain there, as it is supposed to be there, since this is Guyana

Enough said, but I will iterate incessantly that Guyana is a forsaken and decaying land. Just investigate and find out who goes for Medicare where and whose children are born outside of Guyana and who studies where. I rest my case.

Yours truly,
Prescott Mann

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