A satire is defined as sarcasm, witty language used to convey insults or scorn. And the Kaieteur News daily feature Dem Boys Seh has been very successful at using caustic remarks to irritate its intended victims. However, when a cheap shot is taken to mitigate the significance of a nursery school and to lie about the amenities and size of classrooms to give the impression of corruption in the construction of the facility, I must question the motive to negatively influence the readers of Kaieteur News during a crucial election campaign.I was at the opening of the Number 77 Nursery School, and the only person there from Kaieteur News was their Berbice reporter whose article was published about a week later. This was a fair and balanced report which should have stood on its own merit. But apparently, someone felt that it made the Ministry of Education and the PPP/C Government look too good, and a deliberate, malicious attempt was made to distort the facts to give the Opposition another talking point on the campaign trail. But even if this was not intended, the Dem Boys Seh column of April 16: “Each child can build dem own nursery school in dem backyard” is a malicious distortion of facts, written by someone who has not seen this school. How else can one account for the ludicrous description of this facility given by Dem Boys Seh, “…dem open a li’l nursery school. De school got six classroom that look like six huts. Dem tell de nation that it cost $82.3 million. Dem seh that dem build de school for 120 children but de villages only got 60 children. Each pickney coulda build he personal nursery school in he backyard wid that kind of money and coulda hire a private teacher till dem children tun adults …De $82M school got sick bay (one li’l bed and a medicine cupboard); a kitchen wid a $6,000 sink and a pipe that run outside in de yard—(no stove or cooking gas); washroom facility – (three toilet wid couple plastic bucket nearby); and administrative department (that got seating capacity like a judge and jury courtroom but no air conditioning) and of course, landscaping—two cutlass, one axe and fork. That’s $82 M, Priya and Armogan.”
Editor, in a very sarcastic way, the author is suggesting that the building did not cost $82 million as reported by Education Minister, the Hon. Priya Manickchand, who described the building as a state of the art school, built to CARICOM standards. “It is elaborate and extravagant with a large play area. It is colourful, bright, and built to accommodate children with disability.” The classrooms are all fairly big and well-designed. The sanitary block has three toilets for the girls, three for the boys, and two much wider individual toilets with hand bars, specially designed for children with disability, a total of eight toilets, not the three stated in the Kaieteur News column. This beautifully designed school includes ramps for the handicapped, and a water trough with three receptacles, not one. Although it is true that while the school is built to accommodate 120 children and enrollment stands at only 60, it is not a waste of money as the article suggests. In fact, the school is built to accommodate the children of a fast growing housing scheme at Number 77 Village, Corriverton, and Kaieteur News should have been the ones complimenting the Government on its vision and proper planning to facilitate those families with young children that will soon take up residence in that housing scheme. By any standard, this school is superbly built… the best in the Region 6, and is certainly more modern and spacious than most nursery schools in Guyana. Why then would anyone pick on this school to deliberately lie about the construction and amenities offered? One must therefore examine the motive behind such a malicious newspaper column, and expose the prejudice nature of its author.
The PPP/C is in a struggle to regain votes lost to the AFC in Regions 5 and 6 during the 2011 general election. The PNC-APNU-AFC Prime Ministerial Candidate, Moses Nagamootoo, had promised to deliver 11% of the Indian-vote to the PNC-APNU as part of the AFC’s negotiation process leading up to his Party’s marriage of convenience with the PNC-APNU. Overwhelming numbers by PPP/C supporters attending public meetings and rallies in Regions 5 and 6, coupled with the failure of the PNC-APNU-AFC to bring out the residents of Whim to their recently held “import a crowd” rally there, strongly suggest that Nagamootoo will find it almost impossible to deliver the 11% Indian-vote on May 11. Therefore, Khemraj Ramjattan and Moses Nagamootoo need some help to sway support away from the PPP/C in those traditional PPP strongholds. And since this nursery school is located some distance away from the main public road all the way in Corriverton, it is unlikely that the undecided voter will go there to verify the authenticity of this Dem Boys Seh column. In fact, voters are more likely to believe this crap, chalking it up to yet another “corruption” allegation by Kaieteur News. When one considers that there has never been an issue of the Dem Boys Seh column that criticises or makes fun of the PNC; the APNU; the AFC, or any member of the Opposition, one can safely deduct that this Kaieteur News column is designed only to ridicule and embarrass members of the ruling PPP/C, and to undermine progress by constantly insinuating corruption exists in everything the PPP/C Government does.
How can Adam Harris, editor of Kaieteur News, rein in the ‘out-of-control’ Freddie Kissoon that spews lies, anger and filth on a daily basis, tarnishing the reputation of decent people, when he allows the very same vile thoughts to be published as Dem Boys Seh in a newspaper that prides itself to be ‘independent’?
Harry Gill
