PNCR salutes achievements of Dr. Roger Luncheon

Aug 04, 2023 Letters

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Dear Editor,

The People’s National Congress Reform wishes to join the rest of the nation in mourning the passing of Dr. Roger Forbes Luncheon, Medical Practitioner, Cabinet Secretary, Head of the Presidential Secretariat, a former Member of the PPP Executive Committee, and the PPP Central Committee.

As can be seen from the many important positions he held, Dr. Luncheon achieved an important status in the professional and political life of the nation. The Party has no difficulty in saluting these achievements but is not averse to pointing out that Dr. Luncheon was a formidable and, at times, a testing opponent of the Party. In its contest with him, the PNC believed that Dr. Luncheon made the wrong political choices but respected the steadfast manner and philosophical tenacity with which he held his views and opinions, especially as it related to the defense of the PPP, even when those policies were soiled by racism and illegality.

Dr. Luncheon came from a generation of Guyanese whose parents placed emphasis on the need for quality education and importance of service to the community. Dr. Luncheon’s father was a policeman who was well known for his service in the Kitty District. Dr. Luncheon was inclined to serve his country and community. He excelled at primary school and entered Queens College. Having entered Howard University, his outstanding performance as a medical student is still remembered to this day. The PNC played some role in Dr. Luncheon’s return to Guyana and he retained friendships with many of its leading members over the years until his death. A good many were his patients. And here it must be stated that, despite the seeming public adversity, Dr. Luncheon and his family, especially his father, enjoyed a relationship with the Leader of the PNC, Mr. Linden Forbes Sampson Burnham, after whom Dr. Luncheon is named. It was this complex relationship with the PNC and the personal relationship with the Burnham family that made Dr. Luncheon’s political persona complex as well as ambivalent. This complexity and ambivalence were manifested when he offered his services when President Burnham entered the hospital for surgery on August 6th 1985.

Politics changed him. The articulate, chatty, vernacular-loving, intellectually inclined individual became a confirmed Marxist Leninist who embraced the principles and politics of the PPP. Not surprisingly, as a trusted member of the party, Dr. Luncheon was given the significant positions of Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Presidential Secretariat when the PPP won the elections in 1992. In these portfolios, Dr. Luncheon not only displayed his intellectual acumen but also revealed his mastery of the English Language. His pronouncements at press conferences could be Delphic as well as impressive. He was the author of the phrase the “feral blast” as a description of the attack by Ms. Priya Manickchand on the outgoing American Ambassador. It is a phrase which has resonance to this day. Dr. Luncheon’s press conferences were more open and revealing than what passes today for encounters with the fourth estate by the ruling party. It was Dr. Luncheon too who coined the phrase “phantom gang” to describe the emergence of an extra-judicial killing machine in Guyana. This machine, which appeared during the tenure of President Bharrat Jagdeo, consumed the lives of over 400 young men and Dr. Luncheon is not without some responsibility for this unprecedented violence in our post-independence history.

As Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr. Luncheon accumulated formidable power in his hands. In fact, it is not a fanciful claim that the PPP never engaged in any major political or policy exercise without Dr. Luncheon’s input. He was in charge of the NIS; actively involved in intelligence gathering; he maintained an iron grip on the Foreign Service; and was a PPP representative in the Dialogue with the PNC. It may be observed here that Dr. Luncheon was not shy in the exercise of the power he held or reluctant to affirm the dominance in the PPP. He caused the PNC to suspend the aforementioned dialogue with the PPP.

It is not possible for the PNC to issue this statement about Dr. Luncheon without remarking on an occurrence which even from this distance in time seems incomprehensible. Dr. Luncheon had rendered unmatched service to the PPP. He had deployed his considerable power to get PPP policies through. His loyalty to the party was unquestioned.

Yet when he was proposed as the Presidential candidate for the 1997 elections it was rejected. The true story about the relationship between Dr. Luncheon and the PPP which he chose to serve is yet to be written. It might contain some surprises. Notwithstanding his individual shortcomings, the PNC has concluded that despite at times his adversarial opposition to the PNC, Dr. Luncheon was a man of exceptional academic and political brilliance. Above all he was a Guyanese to the bone. The Party extends sincere condolences to Dr. Luncheon’s family, his loved ones and close friends.

Regards,

People’s National Congress Reform

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• Cabinet Secretary, Dr. Roger Forbes Luncheon, Head of the Presidential Secretariat, medical practitioner, Peoples National Congress Reform, phantom gang

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