Ramjattan speaks from both sides of his mouth
THE MAIN agitators in the sugar industry, the AFC, have shown once again their real agenda as they slam the PPP/C government’s budget for “bailing out” the sugar industry. Self-proclaimed champions of the sugar workers, Khemraj Ramjattan and Moses Nagamootoo, are objecting to the government’s $4 billion allocation to the sugar industry that was recently disclosed in Parliament during Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh’s Budget presentation on Friday last, which is in keeping with the  doublespeak with which they have become synonymous.
Even before elections, while campaigning to wrest sugar workers’ support away from Dr. Jagan’s party in favour of the AFC, that party’s candidates have been taking different messages to different communities.
For instance, while Nigel Hughes, Freddie Kissoon and Mark Benschop were telling people in the Buxton, Plaisance and other communities dominated by Guyanese of African descent that the PPP/C has been marginalizing African Guyanese in favour of Indo-Guyanese communities, conversely, Nagamootoo, Ramjattan, Gerhardt Ramsaroop and the ‘juju doctor’ were telling the Indo-Guyanese communities, especially sugar workers, that the government was neglecting their traditional supporters — meaning Indians, especially sugar workers — in favour of workers in the bauxite industry and other Afro-Guyanese communities.
It is no secret that many CARICOM countries were forced out of the sugar industry because of the EU sugar price cuts, which is causing massive losses every year to that sector in Guyana, with grave impacts to the workers, along with their families, who benefit directly and/or indirectly from the sugar industry.
To its credit, the PPP/C administration, recognizing the terrible consequences that either majorly scaling down or closing the sector would have had on the over 100,000 persons who earn their livelihood from the industry have been battling to sustain the industry, including to date, the largest single investment in Guyana – the modern hi-tech sugar factory in Skeldon.
Rather than being supported in its struggles to keep the industry alive, many sugar workers have been largely unappreciative that these short-term trials would ultimately result in long-term benefits and have been, through the ugly rhetoric and the agitation by opposition elements, especially PPP/C defector Moses Nagamootoo, acting in ways inimical to the interest of the industry, especially through constant strikes that have caused massive losses to the industry and threats to Guyana’s sugar markets.
One wonders when GuySuCo workers would see the real faces behind the masks of concern shown to them by the opposition elements, especially Ramjattan and Nagamootoo, who have both joined with the PNC to bring the party of Dr. Cheddi Jagan down because they aspired to the positions of Bharrat Jagdeo and Donald Ramotar.  Their opportunistic shenanigans in and out of parliament have marked their real agenda, as this latest salvo against the budget has shown.
GuySuCo is still in trouble, although slowly gaining ground, and Dr. Ashni Singh’s budget has earmarked $4 billion to support the sugar industry’s efforts to remain a viable force in the national economic and social development construct.
While the PNC’s negative reaction to the PPP/C administration’s Budget is traditional and expected, it is the reaction of the mealy-mouthed AFC members, who are (mis)representing themselves to be very concerned over the welfare of sugar workers, that the misled people should take heed of and recognize them for the two-faced charlatans that they are.
A while back the Government had tried to simultaneously support two sectors with a strategy that benefited the housing sector as well as the sugar industry.
With the purchase of lands valued at $4 billion from GuySuCo Minister of Housing, Irfaan Ali was able to make provision for homes for an approximate 17,000 Guyanese families and the Government was, at the same time, providing much-needed capital to the troubled sugar industry. This move by the Government facilitated empowering mechanisms to help two sectors that benefited tens of thousands of Guyanese families, including an approximate 100,000 persons who benefit directly and indirectly from the sugar industry.
Khemraj Ramjattan went on a tirade in and out of Parliament, grandstanding in the media and elsewhere, laying all kinds of charges against Government, and in particular Housing Minister, Irfaan Ali, even taking the minister to the Privileges Committee in an ongoing, relentless witch-hunt, even while the beneficiaries were happily processing their house lot acquisition and building their own homes.
According to Minister Irfaan Ali, this was not only a complete betrayal of sugar workers by Ramjattan, but of all poor Guyanese families who aspire to own their own homes, and who have benefited from the acquisition of additional lands by the Ministry of Housing.
This is the man who wants to be president of the nation, making wild promises the merits of, and the ability to deliver on, those content with being fooled are not questioning.
But this latest broadside against sugar workers should open their eyes to see clearly the two faces that Ramjattan, and indeed all the AFC charlatans show to them in their duplicitous actions and words.
When the collective opposition argues that the PPP/C’s 2012 Budget does not provide for the poor people of the country, then one wonders what they would term the school-feeding programmes, the techvoc and all the other empowerment initiatives, including the Women of Worth (WoW) programme meant to educated and empower school dropouts, single mothers and other vulnerable members of society; what they would term free health services countrywide (despite the odd hiccup here and there); what they would term all the hinterland development projects; what they would term all the capital works meant to make life more comfortable for all Guyanese citizens, even if everything cannot be achieved immediately; what they would term the massive housing drive that has given persons who lived in absolute penury homes that they never had any hope of owning in their lifetimes, which facilitates wealth-creation by providing homeowners with collateral for acquiring loans to start businesses; what would they term the provision of the facilitating mechanisms for the current business boom?
The PNC is accustomed to speaking with forked tongues; and if one truly wants to see the real face of the AFC, then they should look at last Saturday’s edition of the Stabroek News, where Ramjattan is framed sandwiched between Granger and Carl Greenidge – vultures of a feather flying in a flock.
As lawyers, Ramjattan’s and Nagamootoo’s sophistry with words are exceptional; liar-liar, speaking from two sides of their mouths.