The Stabroek News and Guyana’s ugly psychology

Dec 31, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Kaieteur News – Here is a quote that involves my name in a letter published yesterday in the Kaieteur News (KN) by Professor Randolph Persaud who is the constitutional affairs advisor to the President: “I fully agree with KN columnist Freddie Kissoon that government must be even-handed in executing its clean-up and clear-out campaigns.”

In the same letter published the same day in the Stabroek News (SN), my name is removed. I quote the relevant line: “I fully agree that government must be even-handed in executing its clean-up and clear-out campaigns.” As you can see, the name Freddie Kissoon was removed.”

This is the story of my life more than 55 years ago. Am I bothered? No. More people read the Kaieteur News because it is free online so I don’t need the SN to mention my name for me to be known. The Gildarie-Freddie Kissoon Show is hugely popular programe and my views on that forum are seen by more viewers than readers of SN.

The point is that it is foolish to take out my name when the very letter will be published by the KN and read by more persons and more so because of the status of the letter-writer. In this age of social media, is it silly for a mainstream media to hide something when the whole world will know about it from social media.

This piece is being written on Friday morning to be submitted later in the day. But I certainly will raise this ugly psychology of SN on the Gildarie-Freddie Kissoon Show this evening (last night).

So, will we hear from the owner of SN, Ms. Isabelle De Caires who lives in the UK? Will she pen an open letter in her newspaper telling her editors that what they did was unprofessional?

This is the same lady that a few months ago in a letter in her newspaper described Guyana as a flawed democracy. Her grievance was over the way the Natural Resource Fund Act was drafted. Does Ms. Isabelle De Caires believe that the way her newspaper’s journalism is presented to the Guyanese makes Guyana a flawed democracy?

So will the Guyanese people see a letter from Ms. De Caires on a display of sick petty-mindedness? I don’t know about you, but I have the answer. I have been part of Guyanese society for so long so I know the answer.

What all those who care about freedom and justice in Guyana so they write all the time for government to be transparent, accountable, democratic? Will we hear from them about the danger to democracy when the press, long regarded as one of the fulcrums of democracy can be so ugly in its psychology.

Do you realize what has happened here? You need to come to grips with the nature of this society. This newspaper took out my name, just a name from the man’s letter. It was not a panegyric of Freddie Kissoon or a letter of praise about some particular act of me.

Two things are horrible here. One is people cannot mention my name in their letters in the Stabroek News. That right is no longer respected by the newspaper. The second one is I am now persona non grata by this newspaper. It means that the newspaper will not report anything about me.

Do I care? I will be the same Frederick Kissoon as I was over 55 years ago. And I will have my detractors and admirers and the Stabroek News will play no part in changing that equation. It all began in 1968 when I was a polling agent for the PPP at my school, St. Thomas More RC, primary school in Wortmanville in the 1968 general election.

I pursued a pathway since that time that is full of regrets but I have never been deterred in saying and doing what I feel is right. I cannot say I know why SN has this attitude towards me. I live a quiet, morally clean life. I am not involved in any criminal circuit. I have no position of power where I can hurt people. I am not employed in any capacity whatsoever in Guyana.

I guess SN does not like me because I am not a worm like so many others that choose to shut their mouths and open it based on horrible moral double standards. Yes, I have had an ocean of regrets during the course of my life but I will never be a servile or sycophantic human.

I am not afraid of anything or anyone in this country where the collective psychology is deeply ugly. Nothing in this country shocks me. Nothing should shock you in a country that has no soul.

(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.)