THE recent Babu John event confirmed what most people already know, and that is, former President of Guyana Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo is a potent force as one of the key PPP/C campaigners. It is not surprising, therefore, that Jagdeo remains a powerful threat to the flimsy foundation of the APNU-AFC coalition. And so in an attempt to dilute Jagdeo’s impact, the coalition sought to label him a racist in his address at the recent Babu John event in Port Mourant, Berbice.
On that date, the PPP/C amassed a crowd of thousands at Babu John to commemorate the 18th death anniversary of former President of Guyana Dr. Cheddi Jagan and the 5th death anniversary of another former President Mrs. Janet Jagan. It was at this forum that Jagdeo began to unwrap the fragile foundation package of the APNU-AFC coalition in a ground-breaking speech lasting 31 minutes and 16 seconds.
On Jagdeo’s address, APNU-AFC mouthpieces accused Jagdeo of making racist remarks, a red-herring argument. What did Jagdeo say at Babu John on March 8, 2015 that seemed to have produced some orgasmic confusion about racism? Jagdeo captured the following points, among others in his address:
* During the PNC era, Jagdeo saw his father wept when the police removed the ballot boxes from Gibson Primary School where he was a student. His father cried because he had no voice in the choice of political leadership in his own country.
* Mr. Carl Greenidge as PNC’s Finance Minister from 1983-1992 painted a sordid picture of Guyana’s economic status in the 1992 budget speech; and in fact, as Minister of Finance, he presented no government audit report for 10 years between 1983 and 1992. The PPP/C Government has presented an audit report for each year since 1992.
* As a senior personnel in the Guyana Defence Force, Mr. David Granger refused to account for the record, the fiasco in the removal of ballot boxes from official polling booths and in the assassination of Dr. Walter Rodney.
* If elected as President, Granger promises to have three Vice Presidents in true Burnham-style governance. And so while the Opposition talked about the high cost of Jagdeo’s pension, the institution of three vice presidents and a prime minister means that the country will have to meet the costs of five public officials inclusive of the president. And amazingly, APNU-AFC peddles the notion of cutting costs.
* Over the last three years, President Ramotar must have had a nightmare, as the one-seat parliamentary majority APNU-AFC Opposition stymied everything. APNU-AFC Opposition opposed the Berbice Bridge, Specialty Hospital, Amaila Hydropower Project, rice farmers, and sugar workers (APNU-AFC even promises to close down the sugar industry).
* APNU-AFC is not the ‘change’; over the years, the nation has seen only changes in name: PNC; PNCR; PNC One Guyana; APNU; and now APNU-AFC. Its substance remains unchanged.
* The PPP/C is living the change in its transformation of the financial architecture through new approved legislations on companies; financial institutions; securities, revenue authority; procurement; insurance; a modern Deeds Registry; and with the Auditor-General no longer reporting to the Minister of Finance, but to Parliament.
* Results of the PPP/C Government’s changes in the financial architecture have produced these outcomes with tremendous impact for the nation: debt is now 60% of the economy when in 1992 it was 7.5 times; now 5% of the revenue services the debt when it was 94% of the revenue in 1992; economy in 1992 was US$300 million, now it is over US$3 billion; at the Bank of Guyana, reserves in 1992 were US$100 million, now US$800 million; inflation in single digit when it used to be in triple digit; aggregate bank deposits up 15-fold, with low interest rates.
* Over the last three years, APNU-AFC cut $89 billion from the budget, inclusive of $4 billion for Amerindian development and $200 million for the University of Guyana student loan.
* APNU-AFC has commenced manipulating racism on the electorate through the ethnic count; for instance, APNU-AFC spokespersons continue to allude to the migration of a large number of Indian people, bolstered by the U.S Embassy granting of 51,000 10-year visas. And according to media reports, the AFC leadership said that it will deliver 11,000 Indians to the coalition, as if there was some ‘transport’ on these people.
* In the 2011 election campaign, there was drumming in some African Guyanese villages where Opposition activists called on villagers to get out and vote the ‘coolies’ out.
Among these 11 bullet points, where is the racism in Jagdeo’s address? Prejudice and racism relate to a negative view of one group of people only due to their membership in that group; and where one ethnic group may receive unfair treatment because of its race or ethnicity.
Jagdeo said nothing about providing unfair treatment to another group on the basis of race in his address, and so APNU-AFC unfairly has referred to Jagdeo’s remarks as racist. In fact, Contributing Editor of the National Review and Senior Editor of The American Spectator Quin Hillyer made similar attacks against U.S. President Barack Obama, as outlined by M.S. in Democracy in America in the Economist on December 6, 2013.
Former President Jagdeo strongly asserted that APNU-AFC commenced race-baiting vis-à-vis ethnic count, as verified by the last two bullet points. But the immediacy and surge of the vehement opposition to Jagdeo’s address as racism could be a counter for the Opposition to camouflage its own strategy of ethnic count and other forms of race-baiting.
Jagdeo merely identified the Opposition’s racial activities evidenced by the media. Instead of APNU-AFC instituting corrective action to its persisting racial slurs, it marshalled its usual suspects to engage in an all-out offensive against Jagdeo, and indirectly against the PPP/C.
In Hillyer’s negative attribution to Obama and in APNU-AFC’s tirade against Jagdeo, it seems that the energy of partisanship in both cases is more geared toward worsening racial conflicts rather than exerting efforts to create a space for dialog. However, I suspect that any offensive against Jagdeo is an offensive against the PPP/C.

It is not surprising that Jagdeo remains a powerful threat to the flimsy foundation of the APNU-AFC coalition

By Dr. Prem Misir