THOUSANDS of Guyanese fans have expressed disappointment, and have strongly condemned the organised campaign spearheaded by opposition forces, especially from A Partnership for National Unity (APNU),  to prevent world-renowned musical artiste Chris Brown from coming to Guyana.

Outrage and shock could be used to describe some of the sentiments being expressed by the general public over the announcement yesterday from the Hits and Jams Entertainment Team that the artiste has backed out of performing in Guyana at ‘Unforgettable 2’, due mainly to APNU-instigated protests.
Chief Executive Officer of Hits and Jams Entertainment, Rawle Ferguson, yesterday confirmed that the award-winning singer cancelled his December 26 performance in Guyana due to those protests.
The Hits and Jams Entertainment Group, in a release to the media, said Brown’s management team  decided to pull the artiste from his performance because of “concerns over recent media reports about protests over the artiste’s intended visit to Guyana and his performance here”.
Brown’s management, according to HJ officials, also explained that “they do not feel comfortable at this stage allowing the multi award-winning singer to come to Guyana as they have been following reports in the local and international press about the protests over his Guyana appearance.
“His management team has indicated that they remain interested in having the singer perform in Guyana but just not at this time under the current circumstances”, the release explained.
These protests were largely orchestrated and directed by A Partnership for National Unity and its alleged youth arm, Youth Coalition for Transformation (YCT).
Tourism Minister Irfaan Ali has reportedly also signalled that the country could have gained a massive boost with respect to the promotion of Guyana as a prime tourism destination.
Since Hits and Jams announced in October that Brown would be coming to Guyana to perform on Boxing Day, APNU moved to the National Assembly of Guyana and under the guise of soliciting answers about “government’s alleged sponsorship of the show”, publicly declared its non-support for the concert and moreso, the artiste.
APNU Member of Parliament Carl Greenidge had also quizzed Minister Ali about alleged tax exemption being provided for the show and even though the minister clarified the government’s role in the entire scheme of things, the issue was highly politicised.
Speaker of the National Assembly Raphael Trotman was forced to intervene when a fracas broke out in the parliament declaring that “Brown was not on trial here”.
The youth arm of the APNU coalition group, YCT,  then publicly condemned the organisers for bringing Brown to Guyana while urging the administration to promote local talent and called on Guyanese to subliminally boycott the concert. Other pro-opposition human rights groups had also jumped on the bandwagon supporting Brown’s non-performance at the event.
“I believe that some extremist political figures made contact with Chris Brown’s camps and made threats to the crew lying about political instability in Guyana over his appearance, when they fully well know that Brown enjoys mass support here in Guyana”, a Hits and Jams Official told the Chronicle yesterday when the news broke that Brown was no longer coming to Guyana.
Already,  APNU’s actions which observers agree were the sole cause of  Brown’s decision to pull out of the concert are sowing seeds of discord and proving to be  highly unpopular.