A woman named Simone Mangal-Joly (SMJ), who belongs to the anti-oil lobby, published a letter a few days ago that I replied to (see my column of last Wednesday titled, “The mangled politics of Ms. Mangal Joly”). There is a line in that letter that I suggest you read. If you have read it, read it again. If you haven’t, then please do so. It is in last Sunday’s Stabroek News.
It is a very revelatory line that once more shows you the powerful contribution Sigmund Freud made to philosophy. For the second time on this page of mine in the Guyana Chronicle, I will quote SMJ: “These actions remind me of what I have been experiencing and witnessing first hand since 2021 with the psychologically hostile way the State has been responding to legitimate concerns….”
By “these actions” the lady was referring to what she believes is government’s anti-democratic behaviour. Ask yourself, and when you do so, think a bit energetically on it; why did she date her experience about “wrong” things she has been seeing in Guyana with regards to the government from 2001 and not from March 2020 when in September 2020, undemocratic forces in reaction to the world’s acceptance of the March election used violence against Indian people in Region 5?
Why you think SMJ blocked out 8 months of horrible occurrences in 2020 and started her supposed frustration with the government in 2021? Putting Freudian analysis to that line of SMJ will reveal the nature of middle-class politics and the role of class and colour in Guyana since 2020 and the attitude of certain organisations and individuals since the Ali presidency was inaugurated in August 2020.
Here are the words of Mr. Ralph Ramkarran. I quote him once more as I did in my last Wednesday piece because he escapes the ugly criticism of government haters who condemn writers that see the government in a favourable light as soup drinkers. Mr. Ramkarran is not a government supporter. I quote him again for emphasis: “It was therefore no surprise to me that at this time there were only a few muffled voices protesting the attempt to rig the elections of 2020 and that the vociferous civil society that does not spare the PPP or its governments, fell largely silent. Civil society must not now complain when some articulate what they believe to be its tarnished record.”
So, who are these organisations and individuals whose attitude to the ruling PPP call for Freudian analysis? Apart from SMJ, there is Dr. Nigel Westmaas, Dr. Alissa Trotz; the two Veira sisters, Vanda and Danuta Radzik-Veira; Guyana Human Rights Association; Transparency International-Guyana chapter; Stabroek News, Red Thread; SASOD; Electoral Reform Group; Oil and Gas Governance Network; certain women rights’ organisations; certain Stabroek News columnists and the list goes on.
You read the repertoire of these people and the gap is so huge that a herd of elephants can pass through the aperture. What is the flaw in their activism? It can be graphically seen in that infamous line of MSJ in which her mind is tormented by what she has been seeing since 2021. There is no condemnation of the rejection of the no-confidence motion, five months of election rigging and the marauding violence against Indian people in Region 5 after it was claimed that PPP supporters killed two African youths.
Mr. Mike McCormack, the alleged lone activist in the Guyana Human Rights Association became a relentless voice denouncing the police and the government over the handling of the homicide of the two youths. But the same McCormack was unseen and unheard during the five months of election rigging. Guyanese are funny people. Stabroek News columnist, Dr. Bertrand Ramcharran sent me an email last year asking me not to criticize Mr. Mc Cormack because he thinks Mr. McCormack played a useful role against the Burnham dictatorship.
I told Dr. Ramcharran that was then, what about now? I described for this gentleman, the untold numbers who were with Mr. McCormack fighting against rigged elections in the 1970s and 1980s and were around in 2020 denouncing fraudulent elections once more but McCormack was missing in action from March to July in 2020. See my three responses to Dr. Ramcharran- March 21, 2022, “Crude vulgarizations if not confronted will get into the history books”; March 22, 2022, “Dear Sir: This is not how historians do research” and November 6, 2022, “Herschel Walker and the self-interest mania that hurts civilisation.”
So, will we hear from SMJ again? Of course, we will. SMJ feels, like the organisations and individuals listed above, that they have things to say. When those things are false, we must reply.