Dear Editor,

POLITICIANS Promising People (P.P.P.). I can remember like thousands of other persons, particularly those of us who live at the south end of the Essequibo Coast or to be more precise, Supenaam to Adventure, Region Two.

That prior to the 2006 General and Regional Elections, a meeting was convened at the Aurora School by the regional administration. At that meeting, the gathering was told by the then President Mr Bharrat Jagdeo that if the PPP Government is returned to office five thousand five hundred (5,500) acres of land for agricultural purposes would be empoldered and distributed to the landless; at that meeting there more than 500 people.

Presentations were also made by the then Agriculture Minister Mr Robert Persaud and other senior regional and national agriculture officials, all of them echoing the statements made by Jagdeo; however, from 2006 to 2011, nothing happened that suggested that this project called the Aurora Land Development would become a reality, at least any time soon. Jagdeo of course got his second term.

Then in 2011, Jagdeo not being eligible for a third term and with Mr Donald Ramotar, widely considered his preferred person as the PPP’s presidential candidate, came back to the same school again accompanied by Agriculture Minister Robert Persaud and other senior national and regional officials and made the same promises to the people; of course, Ramotar was seeking his first term this time. They went much further by stating the cost of the project which was estimated to be 1.3 billion (one point three billion Guyana Dollars), and that machines and other equipment had already been purchased and would be soon arriving on site.
After months of the Ramotar presidency nothing happened, and nothing was said of the much promised and widely expected project, a project that would have benefitted thousands of people directly and indirectly.

I as a Regional Democratic Councillor who was also a member of the Works and Agriculture Committee, a statutory committee of the RDC questioned repeatedly why works on this project has not started as was promised by a former and then sitting president; no answer was ever provided. Ramotar’s presidency came to an end and works on this project, promised by both Jagdeo and Ramotar, never got off the ground. As as the saying goes, “Promises are comforting words, but only to fools.” It is certainly not too late for both of these past People’s Progressive Party PPP Presidents to say why this much promised and touted project never ever got started.

Regards

Archie W. Coris