I disagree with the Arthur Chung name

Nov 26, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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Kaieteur News – I lived under the titular presidency of Arthur Chung and in that time (1970-1980), I didn’t see any profound contribution from Mr. Chung that warranted his appellation on the body of the National Convention Centre.

Mr. Chung had no outstanding legacy in Guyana before being appointed by President Burnham. He served as a magistrate and then a High Court judge and in those two capacities, there was no brilliance or extraordinary tenure.

Why Mr. Burnhan named him president, we may never know because it has not been written about by anyone including Hamilton Green. What is known is that Mr. Burnham rejected names proposed by Opposition Leader, Cheddi Jagan.

For all his brilliance, Burnham was also an insecure person. In the anti-colonial period, Mr. Burnham displayed a tendency of both jealously and insecurity in relation to big charismatic names around his party.

Two educated and handsome men Burnham felt threatened with by their charm. One was economist, Dr. Rawle Farley. The other was attorney, John Carter. Burnham saw to it that both men were marginalised.

Burnham was unsure too about attorney Llewellyn John who was popular among Blacks and came from a landed family. John suffered a nasty fate at the hand of Burnham. Burnham could not defeat Walter Rodney because unlike Farley, Carter and John, Rodney was not challenging Burnham from within the PNC.

What I am leading up to is that Burnham rejected Jagan’s choice of Ashton Chase for the presidency because Burnham knew that Chase was a huge, respected lawyer, non-fiction author and trade unionist.

What this meant was that in running the affairs of the country, Chase would have been entrenched in the limelight just as Burnham, a reality Burnham would not have been happy with. What Burnham did then was that he plucked a name out of obscurity and made him the president.

So why did President Granger name one of the most known buildings in Guyana after Chung? Granger gave an arid public explanation which has no validity whatsoever. He said he wanted the first president to be remembered.

First, he was not a substantial president; his office was ceremonial. Secondly why put Chung’s stamp on such a prominent place when other deserving Guyanese should have been selected?

The answer lies in Granger’s deep psychic admiration of Burnham. Before we continue, it must be noted for those who do not know that during his presidency, Mr. Granger housed four foundations in Burnham’s name at his private home on D’Urban Backland (please see my column of September 2, 2019 titled, “Has anyone asked Granger what is his interpretation of Burnham?”).

My belief is that Granger named the Convention Centre after Chung because he, Granger felt that in doing so he was displaying another act of preserving the legacy of Burnham. I don’t think a government should just remove Chung’s name but I certainly don’t think Chung’s name was appropriate.

Now read this in relation to naming places and here one can see the Freudian mind of certain people. When Ruel Johnson was former cultural policy advisor to Minister of Education, Dr. Roopnaraine, he said an inexplicable thing happened.

He discussed the mystery a few months ago on the Gildarie-Freddie Kissoon Show. He said that no one at the ministry knew who had given the authority to take off the sign, “The Walter Rodney Archives” from the building of the archives. He added that other ministers did not know. Johnson then nodded in the affirmative when asked if it was the top man that gave the order.

What the incident at the national archives show is how naming places can occur. Some personalities are favoured and others frowned upon. But the criterion should be the legacy and contribution of the person and not how the prime minister or president of a country feels about a particular citizen.

We had Ron Robinson this week on the Gildarie-Freddie Kissoon Show where it was revealed that he chalked up 66 years in theatre and 57 years in broadcasting. Now that is an outstanding, extraordinary contribution to Guyana. There is no logical explanation why there is no place in this country that bears his name.

The same goes for Eddie Grant, Rohan Kanhai and President Desmond Hoyte among others. The new few lines below are about a subject I have raised twice on this page. Opposite St. Rose’s High School at what now is the Indian Garden Monument, is where the original source of Georgetown’s water supply was located. A simple well-painted sign should be erected there. A country that does not recognise its history will soon die.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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