Dark days: A reply to Yuri Westmaas

Jan 18, 2023 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

---

Kaieteur News – I will never stop replying to people whose prejudice, bigotry, subjective mind, propagandistic intention, false narrative, and alternative facts have found presence in the society.

I have argued and will continue to argue that it is incumbent on the public intellectual to offer a counter-narrative because one side of the story is dangerous for society if that story is left unchallenged.

I have lived too long in this country not to be aware of that danger. My life as an activist in this country takes in more than 55 years and even in 2023, I meet people who would ask me about things they read about.

One successful area of discourse is about Forbes Burnham. Countless Guyanese have confronted the fictional greatness of Burnham so that today, there is an ocean of rebuttals available on the demonic and power intoxicating side of Burnham’s rule. Those responses are filled with verifiable facts.

I am working on a column about a friendly conversation I had with a very young cashier at one of the Banks DIH outlets. As I spoke to that girl, the power of offering a polemic that ventilates issues, provides explanations and offer a different narrative forms a rampart against historical distortions.

Now to Mr. Yuri Westmaas. I knew Mr. Westmaas’ father very well. He was the private researcher of Dr. Jagan at the PPP head office- Freedom House. Mr. Westmass’ brother, Nigel, was my personal friend for over two decades.

We parted company over the March 2020 elections. We stopped our correspondence when I publicly revealed that he refused my request to publicly condemn the attempted rigging of the election. My urging was done in March of that year, and by July of the very year, the crystallization of the thoughts on race and politics by the former WPA leaders like Nigel himself, Eusi Kwayana, Moses Bhagwan, Dr Rupert Roopnaraine, Dr. Clive Thomas and so many others that influenced my ideological shape from the 1970s was a devastating psychic shock to me.

I do not know Mr. Yuri Westmass, never read anything he wrote about both the sinister or saccharine sides of Guyana. His letter in the Stabroek News yesterday condemning the PPP government for its removal of the three squatters of Mocha together with a panegyric of David Hinds is replete with expressions of a subliminal and Freudian mind.

I cannot elaborate on this Freudian psychology because I do not want to get into an analysis of class, race and culture in Mr. Westmass’ outlook on things, suffice it to say that I see the trend in his thoughts and as someone who studies and writes on race, class, culture, I know where he is coming from.

Mr. Westmass has every right to choose which topic he wants to expand on and which ones do not concern him. Mr. Westmass has every right to compose his panegyrics on David Hinds. I, on the other hand have a philosophical obligation to those who expect me to offer my perspectives on expressions I see in society.

What concerns me about Mr. Westmass is not his admiration for David Hinds and his condemnation of the PPP government, but his subtle introduction of the anti-dictatorship politics of his father and brother.

I believe this was deliberately done to enhance the efficacy of his argument when for me that efficacy does not exist in his presentation. A person’s prior anti-dictatorship activism cannot be praised in the context the person’s current support for authoritarian instincts.

Mr. Westmass tells us his brother fought the PNC dictatorship. But his brother in the 21^st century refused to condemn the PNC’s old habits in 2020. Mr. Westmass’ father would never have condoned what happened between March 2020 and July 2020. In his letter, Mr. Westmass takes umbrage at President Ali using unpleasant language to describe David Hinds. I don’t know if Mr. Westmass is familiar with Dr. Hinds’ description of the president.

Mr. Westmass claimed that the removal of the squatters have taken Guyana back to dark days. I would like to think that many readers would be interested in knowing which point in history those dark days occurred.

I could offer my interpretation of dark days. Three episodes I will end with. (1), the retrenchment in one swoop of 7000 sugar workers thus devastating 42, 000 families in the sugar industry. (2), a party wining a general election by less than half of a percentage point yet never consulted the opposition and the society in general on any policy. (3), the attempt to take us back to dark days through rigged election. I hope, dearly hope, race and culture do not determine Mr. Westmass’ thoughts on politics.

(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.) 

---

• Dr. Clive Thomas, Dr. Rupert Roopnaraine, Eusi Kwayana, Freddie Kissoon, Moses Bhagwan, Yuri Westmaas

---