– Minister Harmon tells Buxtonians

MINISTER of State Joseph Harmon said although the “flicker of hope” was “dimmed” by the previous administration, the Government will continue to work in the coming years to grow and protect village economies.

Harmon was at the time speaking on the issue of cooperate societies and their importance in organising ordinary people into groups for economic purposes at the village of Buxton on the eve of Emancipation Day.

The Buxton Emancipation Cultural Extravaganza 2018 was celebrated under the theme “Emancipate yourself from Mental and Economic Slavery”.

According to Harmon, emancipation is not only a physical process but a mental one which Guyanese, today, must work to achieve in all areas of their lives.

He said despite the intense efforts of the colonial masters to dehumanise Guyana’s ancestors, they never gave up in their fight for freedom.

“As the shackles are removed from one’s feet, the shackles must also be removed from one’s mind. Through emancipation, therefore, is a process that begins in the mind,” he said.

He added: “Once physical emancipation was achieved, the former slaves demonstrated their mental resilience, their industry and discipline by purchasing abandoned plantations, transforming them into organised villages and started the Village Movement.”

SYSTEMATIC SABOTAGE
However, the minister of state said that the Village Movement was stifled and led to underdevelopment due to the “system and the systematic sabotage of the infrastructure and the flooding of village lands”.

“These measures succeeded in frustrating our ancestors and caused them to abandon their agricultural lands,” Harmon said, adding that the villages nonetheless survived and formed the basis for the establishment of the nation.

However, the same sabotage once occurred again with the previous administration, who sought to do away with cooperate movement and societies for their personal gain, Harmon said.

“Again, the cooperative spirit, the systematic sabotage of our cooperatives, the systematic damaging of our lands by the previous administration, again sought to dim that flicker of hope. But, our people remained strong.

“And so, after decades of the PPP Government in administration, after the systematic sabotage of the agriculture lands of our people here in Buxton, we have now a new hope. We have a new flicker; we have a light that is going to shine bright on this village of Buxton.”

Harmon continued that with the country being on the cusp of the discovery of oil, Guyanese must understand that the revenues from oil will be used to ensure that the needs of villages are addressed.

“We are going to ensure that the infrastructure of the villages are taken care of; we are going to ensure that agricultural extension services are provided to the village; we are going to ensure that drainage and irrigation are fixed in the village; we are going to ensure that we give you back that spark, but it’s up to you, the villagers of Buxton, to ensure that you take advantage of this… all of these things we promise you because we understand that this flicker which was dimmed by this previous administration needs to be rekindled and we, in the Government, will rekindle that spirit,” Harmon pledged.
To do this, he said that the Government will utilise Cooperate Movements as the “vehicle” to take persons out of their current conditions.

He reminded that under the People’s National Congress (PNC) administration after 1966, several cooperate societies were established with 1,444 cooperate societies by 1989.
“By 2016, the PPP had actually shut down or made some of them dysfunctional. At least 130 of those societies were shut down… the PPP wanted to kill those cooperate societies because those societies had large tracks of land under which [they wanted to] control. So the idea was to kill those societies off and to take the land and to distribute it in the way they wanted,” Harmon then revealed.

As such, since taking office the Government has established an Interim Management Committee for the co-op society which, over the last year, has resulted in over 140 cooperate societies being re-established or formed.
The Buxton Emancipation Cultural Extravaganza evening was filled with story-telling, singing of folk songs, dancing, drumming, poetry and more as many within the community demonstrated their talents.

Speaking a message of hope to the villagers, Harmon said: “It is the strength of Buxton; it is that fortitude of Buxton that demonstrates to the rest of Guyana what the ‘black spirit’ is. That it cannot be conquered, that we are resilient people, that in spite of all that is taking place that we stand firm in our belief that we have the power in us to make the changes that are necessary.”