DESPITE his sincerity and open honesty, and his commitment and unremittingly hard work in the process of re-building Guyana after PNC excesses destroyed this country, outgoing Prime Minister Samuel Archibald Hinds has been, throughout his successive terms as either Prime Minister or President of this country, consistently vilified and treated as a pariah by a number of persons in his hometown Linden, because they consider him a traitor for joining the coalition PPP/Civic political movement.However, at the People’s Progressive Party / Civic’s (PPP/C) Linden Rally, held last Sunday at Wismar, he urged supporters to come out in their numbers and vote unanimously for the PPP/C on May 11, because he believes wholeheartedly in the partnership which enabled him to play a major role in charting and implementing systems and policies that transformed this country from a pariah state into what Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines described as “…the only shining star of the Caribbean.”

‘Come out and vote solidly PPP/C… It’s the party that’s always had your back,’ he urged his fellow Lindeners. But it was Prime Minister Sam Hinds’ heart and soul that always mourned his hometown, because he saw, year after year, despite the many interventions by the Government through which he served the Guyanese people, his hometown being used and abused – taken down retrograde paths by leaders they have trusted wholeheartedly for decades.

“We can burst open our country and make it a developed country,” he asserted, continuing, “In 1990, I answered the call to join the PPP/C with former President, Dr. Jagan and end the period of rigged elections and dictatorship in Guyana” Then he went on to reminisce on what transpired in the past, when all Guyanese became victims of an oppressive regime that did not even spare even its own supporters during an era when everyone suffered, driving the citizens of this country – across every divide, into depths of despair, apathy and hopelessness.

The hope for a better life was restored by the PPP/C in 1992, and as the Prime Minister told Lindeners: “Change is evident in Guyana and here in Linden; this community has shared equitably in all aspects from our budget and concessions. Some of the best school buildings are in Linden; also you have one of the best hospitals here, and the best water supply to be commissioned here in linden.”

“We have always ensured that Linden has shared equitably”, he further stated, and reminded his audience “There was an international manager for the bauxite industry prior to 1992; and he was supposed to be able to turn the bauxite industry into a profitable organisation.” This arrangement was agreed to by the People’s National Congress (PNC), he recalled further that when, by 1994 it was apparent that there was no way of turning the industry around, “The PPP/C didn’t close it down; we kept supporting the industry… And we did it because we understood how traumatic it would have been for the people here in Linden.”
And the Prime Minister went on to elucidate on the ways the Government tried to save the industry, into which it kept pumping huge sums, the way it did in the entire community, so that Lindeners were not abandoned to the fallout of a dying economy, which had depended almost entirely on the bauxite industry.

The Government had long recognised that the viability of the bauxite industry was shaky at best and could not, alone, sustain the social development and economic growth of Region 10, so successive PPP/C Governments strove unremittingly to diversify entrepreneurial strengths into other areas of production, especially agriculture, and today that community is once again striving.
PM Sam encouraged: “We have been working for our people since the 1940s; and we should rally our people to come out on May 11 and vote unanimously for the PPP/C.”
However, within the construct of successive PPP/C Governments, all of which the Prime Minister served with dedication and loyalty, it was Samuel Archibald Hinds whose heart always beat for his hometown and the citizens of the community where he spent his youthful days with his devoted wife Yvonne and children; and he always had the backs of his fellow Lindeners as the Government strategised and charted paths for the upward mobility of this nation.
One would hope that PM Hinds would not retire into oblivion, but would continue to play a major part in formulating and implementing developmental paths for this nation through the enduring partnership he formed over two decades ago with his brother of the soul, Dr. Cheddi Jagan and the People’s Progressive Party.