An interesting letter about David Granger’s visit to New York

OLD Kai read an interesting letter by Mr. Mike Persaud in the media on Tuesday June 3, 2014. It was an interesting letter chronicling the events which occurred at his home in Richmond Hill, Queens where he hosted APNU leader David Granger recently. I must say it was a good attempt to squeeze the truth from the Opposition leader but from all accounts this failed.Based on the letter it seemed that the main focus was on ethnic related issues in the country and how that translated to voting patterns. Old Kai is baffled that Mr. Persaud indicated that the Opposition Leader denied that such a reality exists in Guyana or at least shied away from the issue. In reality, there is probably not a single country in the Western hemisphere, or dare I say the world, that does not have such issues. Guyana is no different. It is not as pronounced now as it was during the PNC era and a few years after they came out of Government but it is still with us.
Only in a utopian world will such an issue cease to exist, mankind’s nature thrives on division as a force of motivation. Many have sought to exploit this for varying reasons.
Let it also be known once again, that it was the imperialist forces of the U.S. and U.K. who funded the PNC to create ethnic tensions in Guyana in the first instance. The declassified documents are there for all to read.
I will not dwell specifically on the PNC in Government as what occurred during that period is well noted, some of that is also coming out from the ongoing Dr. Walter Rodney CoI which was requested by his family and for which they lobbied for many years.

Old Kai will also not focus on the early years of the PPP/C Government during the ‘slow fiya mo fiya’ period. I will instead place greater emphasis on the period which Mr. Granger campaigned in the lead up to the 2011 elections. When former President Bharrat Jagdeo, at Babu John, accused Mr. Granger of having ‘blood on his hands’ he was attacked for what some termed inciting along racial lines. Now today, we have dramatic testimony and evidence flowing from the Rodney CoI about the role the PNC has played in the past in targeting opponents. In fact, we are told that only two persons they were instructed not to harm, they being ‘Dr. Cheddi Jagan and Eusi Kwayana’. I am not accusing Mr. Granger of anything but let us recall he is on record as saying he is a long-standing member of the PNC. How is it possible that Mr. Granger who was a senior figure in the GDF hierarchy at the time, a close confidante of late dictator Forbes Burnham and President Desmond Hoyte was apparently unaware of what was occurring around him?

What sort of intelligence official was he, as we are led to believe that he was not aware that guns were being sent from the GDF on behalf of the PNC to the House of Israel to kill Opposition leaders and supporters as the evidence now show?
Pardon the digression, as it was necessary to now establish the calls from known WPA members for Africans to rise up and dig up roads, etc., if the APNU did not win the last elections. To their credit, a section of the WPA distanced themselves from the comments, while individuals such as David Hinds continued the ethnic dilemma rhetoric.
During this period, a former PNC Member of Parliament, at an APNU rally hosted at the Stabroek square, had publicly called for certain businesses to be boycotted. It did not help that the overwhelming majority of owners for those businesses were from a particular ethnic group. Then enter the Linden fiasco, where after initially agreeing with Government, Mr. Granger backtracked on increasing electricity rates to reflect a more realistic billing to consumers. What followed in the aftermath was the resort by Opposition leaders to play up the issue as one of ethnic discrimination. We all know what occurred after that.
In all of this, I cannot recall Mr. Granger condemning this type of behaviour. Or maybe as Mr. Mike Persaud has indicated, Mr. Granger does not think there is such an issue in Guyana.
Maybe this is the reason why Mr. Granger had decided to cut all funding for the Ethnic Relations Commission in 2012 which saw staff members running to him to reverse his decision only for him to wave them away. As indicated by Mr. Persaud, perhaps Mr. Granger saw no need for the ERC.
Mr. Granger’s call for National Unity is a good one but it cannot be only relevant when it is convenient to him and the interests of his party. National Unity is not only about ethnic unity but unity along the lines of our motto.
When Suriname expressed concern about Guyana’s decision to do a geological survey of our Deep South region, which includes the New River Triangle, rather than supporting Suriname’s position, Mr. Granger should have been more concerned about the interests of Guyanese.
We do not see the Surinamese Opposition attacking their Government for including a section of the New River Triangle in their map which Guyana recently objected to. At the point of writing this article, I have not read or heard of any effort by the APNU, to support the Government against the blatant acts of disrespect and misinformation emanating from the WICB. The U.S. Government eventually recognised the concerns of the Guyana Government and agreed to address the issues in its LEAD project, which the GoG had claimed infringed on our sovereignty but APNU publicly encouraged the U.S. to ‘jook’ the Guyana Government as Mr. Granger expertly enunciated his ‘jook fuh jook’ foreign policy. They have done a slash and burn job with three consecutive budgets, most recently slashing the entire Amerindian Development Fund, cutting funding for the Guyana Energy Agency, subvention for University of Guyana students among a host of other programmes. Mr. Granger never condemned the remarks by AFC leader Khemraj Ramjattan referring to Guyanese affected by the budget cuts as ‘collateral damage’. How is that promoting National Unity?
In closing, I have noted reference being made to occasions where the Prime Minister was not allowed to accede to the Presidency in the PPP/C. It has always been my understanding that the agreement was that the Presidential Candidate would come from the PPP and the Prime Ministerial candidate from the Civic. I am not sure if that has changed. Also, it is worthwhile to note that in the lead up to the 2011 elections, of the five members who vied to become the Presidential Candidate of the PPP/C, two were East Indians, one Portuguese and two mixed. Current President Donald Ramotar as we are aware comes from a heritage of Amerindian, African and East Indian.

(To be continued in tomorrow’s edition)