RECENTLY, the youth arm of the People’s Progressive Party, the

Progressive Youth Organisation (PYO) held a series of activities to mark its 60th anniversary, but this group should not rest on its laurels.
The Guyanese people are the legacy left by Dr. Cheddi Jagan – the Father of the Guyanese nation. As long as this nation, as a collective, stands firmly, in unity, to carry on the work to which Dr. Jagan dedicated all his adult life, then the legacy of Dr. Cheddi Jagan will never die.
Detractors label him many types of “ists,” but Dr. Jagan was a humanist, who lived his creed on which he based his primary goal:  “Development with a human face.”
This great leader never lost his simplicity, and his humane approach to problem resolution. His love for humanity crossed every border and transcended every divide to encapsulate the global community, within the concepts and the context of his “New Global Human Order. Although he was dubbed the Mahatma of the western hemisphere because of the greatness of his soul, he never lost the common touch.  Those who knew him can afford to ignore those who attempt to besmirch his character, because he will always walk taller in the corridors of Guyana’s history than anyone else ever can.
Followers of the great Dr. Cheddi Jagan can never let the “uninformed ramblings” of the inconsequential and the insignificant derail the impetus of development initiatives and goals of the People’s Progressive Party, the political party that he founded, which currently forms the government of Guyana.
The Guyana Human Rights Association should take cognisance of the fact that human rights violations were factored into every aspect of the daily existence of every immigrant or emancipated slave, even after slavery was abolished, until the emergence of the People’s Progressive Party.
The struggles and accomplishments of the PPP and the PYO are well chronicled, and the truth shall prevail over those who are attempting to re-write the history to make white seem black, and vice versa.
However, it is incumbent on every member of the PYO to embark on a dynamic thrust to re-affirm its commitment to solidifying its parent party’s base support – the grassroots people, because that is where its strength lies. The grassroots support is the foundation and the backbone of the PPP.  Thus, members should interact with them, be accessible to them in their times of difficulty, because this is the only way the group can build trust and discourage a landscape whereby the opportunists could infiltrate its  ranks with their false promises and grandiose but impractical “solutions”.
The educational quotient in outreach programmes should not be minimised, because knowledge provides armour against the pathological liars who are glib with their tongues and promises, so there is an imperative to let the support base know the truth – and to know if, when and how help can be provided, and what are the dynamics and the implications involved.
If immediate help cannot be provided then they need to be told, and why, so that understanding and tolerance can re-build trust in the areas where the infiltrators have weakened with their misrepresentations and lies.
Dr. Cheddi Jagan always believed in cooperative efforts to build communities, so the PYO needs to follow the example he set and work with persons across every divide in the nation so that it sustains the primary goals always sought after by the founding leader of their group, to unite the nation through trust-building developmental initiatives within Guyanese communities, so as to enhance the social capital of Guyana.