Dear Editor,
I HAVE been observing a certain trend of letter-writing from Mr. Adrian Anamayah (M.P. and Attorney at Law) and Mr. Harry Gill (M.P.), whereby they lavishly lauded the leadership of the former President Mr. Jagdeo to the extent of idol-worshipping him. It seems that they are quite ready to bury the achievements under the late Dr. Cheddi Jagan and install Jagdeo as the new face of the PPP.
I do think that these gentlemen have started to sing very early for their anticipated supper come the 2020 General Elections. I have also noted with interest that most of the letter-writers are MPs of the Opposition.

I have noted that Anamayah credited ‘fundamental transformatiive’ moves to Jagdeo and the former PPP Administration, but failed to mention that one of such moves was to introduce the killer 16% VAT which this government is now feverishly trying to reduce. Another failed ‘transformative move’ was the Skeldon Modernisation project which bankrupted Guysuco and sounded the death knell of an Industry which sustains nearly 16,000 of its own members and supporters.
The old Skeldon factory was still functional at the time and was producing nearly 35,000 tons of sugar, an achievement which the new Skeldon factory is suffering or failing to do. Today, thousands of distraught workers are unclear about their fate because 15 years after the EU cuts were known, Jagdeo and his ‘hardworking’ administration were too busy arranging schemes to enrich themselves through the Skeldon Modernisation project which they knew would fail.

But Skeldon was not the only one. The Amaila Road which was originally contracted to ‘Fip’ Motielall who interestingly never built a road in his life, and after passing through the hands of several contractors became a wasted project since the Amaila Project was scrapped because of several reasons which include its feasibility.
In excess of US$30 million was spent, funds which could have been allocated for more meaningful developmental works. Even so, the maintenance cost of this road will negate its benefits which has been approximated at $120,000 per kilometre and will increase as the road ages. Another of Jagdeo’s great ‘transformative moves.’
Next in line comes the Pradoville 2 enrichment scheme. The ordinary sugar workers pay over $ 500 per square foot for swamp lands with poor infrastructure, while Jagdeo and his gang pay just about $114 per square foot for lands which have top-class infrastructure. Funds that were spent from the government coffers to effect infrastructural developments amounted to hundreds of millions.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to cronyism and corruption. The media and telecommunications sector were not spared. Billions of dollars of taxpayers’ money were squandered through failed projects such as the fibre-optic cable project which cost $1.3 billion. Radio licences and frequencies worth billions were actually gifted to friends and relatives of Jagdeo and other ex-ministers. The names of Robert Persaud and Bobby Ramroop tower above the rest. I guess these were more ‘fundamental transformative’ moves by Jagdeo and his administration.

The above are only some of the corrupt moves by Jagdeo and his administration. The list is very long and includes what it did to the monies from the Petro Caribe deal, the Marriott hotel, the sale of GT&T shares and so many others.
So the next time Mr. Anamayah speaks about ‘fundamental transformative’ moves to suck up to Jagdeo, he should look at some of these and ask himself where this country would have been without the mismanagement, cronyism and corruption dished out to this nation.
Then there are the controversies surrounding the giving away of most of the off-shore oil blocks and the forest concessions. At the end of the day, it is clear that the Jagdeo administration undersold or ‘gifted’ many of our resources for his personal enrichment and for those of his ministers and their friends and families.
This country could have been far ahead than where it was at the end of the PPP’s period in office in 2015, but after the death of the Jagans the PPP fell into the hands of common thieves and their friends who raped and exploited this country mercilessly.
So much for ‘fundamental transformative moves’ by Jagdeo and his gang of desperados.

Yours sincerely,

Muhammad Mustapha