THE Cheddi Jagan Research Centre, on Thursday, hosted an “Evening of Reflection on October 5, 1992,” where several persons recollected the events that led up to this day.
Among the persons who addressed the gathering was Dr. Frank Anthony, who not only shared his thoughts but also spoke on behalf of President Dr Irfaan Ali.
He thanked the Cheddi Jagan Research Centre for organising the event, which reflects what is and will remain a landmark in Guyana’s modern political history.
“It was on the 5th of October, 1992, that our nation was restored to the democratic form and with the process came economic and social reconstruction,” he said.
Dr. Anthony emphasised that October 5, 1992, should not be viewed as a singular event but rather as the culmination of nearly three decades of struggle for democracy in Guyana, which began with the loss of power by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) in 1964, which set in motion a series of events leading to the erosion of workers’ rights, economic turmoil, and the emasculation of the private sector.

“October the 5th was thus not simply about free and fair elections; it was about rescuing Guyana from the clutches of…political repression and economic mismanagement,” Dr. Anthony, who is also Minister of Health, related.

He noted that it was the PPP that stood at the forefront of that struggle against the political dictatorship.
“The PPP would later be joined by other progressive forces in our society, such as the Catholic Church and others following the massively rigged elections in 1985. And then came other persons who joined and together were able to form the patriotic Coalition for democracy. But for much of the early period, it was primarily the PPP which waged that struggle for political liberation, and it was not easy,” he said.

He related that some of their comrades who stood up to defend democracy in the country, did so with their life, as it was a period of victimization.
He explained: “If you spoke up, you were victimized, if you were in a government job you were sent somewhere else, you were dismissed. There were cases where people were removed from a job in Georgetown and sent out to places in the interior.”
The health minister noted that these were the conditions under which people lived.
Another defining feature of the struggle for democracy, he said, was the unity of various classes within Guyanese society, as the nation demanded change amid an economic crisis in 1992.
Here, the PPP/C (People’s Progressive Party/Civic) was formed, comprising members not only from the PPP but also from the business community, professional and academic sectors, and the working class.

This broad-based democracy movement was a result of years of concerted efforts by leaders like Dr. Cheddi Jagan, who worked to build bridges across social classes.
“Dr. Jagan was at the forefront of working with different sectors of our society to put this movement together. Today, we are built upon the foundation and through our party, where our party remains wedded to the working class. We are also a multi class formation, attracting members and forging alliances with people of all classes,” he said.
Minister Anthony related that without the convergence of classes that took place in the run-up to the 1992 elections, they would not have had such a solid platform on which they could pursue class unity.

Recollecting his time working in the health sector in 1993 at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), when they had just started the reconstruction of Guyana’s economy, he said: “In the hospital, you probably had one saline bag and you have five people who needed it and we got to decide which one of them would get the saline.”
“And if that was not bad enough when you went into the building of the hospital, you had holes in the floor. You had rats that were biting people’s toes. These were the kinds of things that we inherited and we forget them,” he said.

The health minister noted that most people forget those instances today, because of how far the country has grown and developed since then.
“Malnutrition was very high in our country. There were people who could not afford a meal. They were suffering from these things. This is where we started from, if you think about the health sector, this is what was happening,” he continued.

Recalling that many of the facilities were dysfunctional, he said they soon after started to work on its development.
“The changes that you saw at GPHC, the investments that the PPP made there, you started seeing a hospital being transformed. But if you fast forward to today, what do we have in the health sector? We have started the construction of twelve new hospitals,” he said.
The Minister noted that Guyana has come a long way since October 5, 1992.