I HAD a civil society activist, Jonathan Yearwood and Kian Jabour, General Secretary of the opposition party, ANUG, on my programme, the Freddie Kissoon Show. I brought up a topic that is dear to my heart – the mistreatment of ordinary people by commercial banks. And I was disappointed by the response of both gentlemen, one of whom will be asking for my vote next year.

I hear the cries of those people often on this issue. I believe all commercial banks operate with complete ignorance of what is the meaning of context. If you do not understand context, you will never fully comprehend both the ordinary and complex contents of human existence. Context is everything. It lies at the foundation of human action. Perhaps no other philosopher has so emphasised the meaning of context in his work than Sigmund Freud.

Let me divert to show the pricelessness of context, then return to context in banking administration. In the press a few days ago, the captain of the Amazon Warriors, Imran Tahir, was listed as the third highest wicket-taker in CPL history. The first was Dwayne Bravo, then Sunil Narine. Now who is the better bowler?

It cannot be Tahir; he is third. But it is Tahir because context will show he is the better bowler. Tahir is third in line but he has taken his wickets in far less matches than Bravo and Narine. This is where context comes in. So let’s return to banking.
When the anti-money laundering act came in at the behest of Western countries, the intention was to prevent the banks in Guyana from washing illegal money. Illegal money going through the banks is in the hundreds of millions not one million or half a million.
Yet all commercial banks grind working class citizens on where they got their $50,000 when they go to deposit it. How could the deposit of $50,000 in terms of the exchange rate be suspicious illegal money?
Context gets lost here completely. How is a dormant account related to money laundering when there is no movement of money, yet customers with dormant accounts have to supply a ton of documents? Context should inform the bank administrators that a dormant account cannot be accused of money laundering.

This crucifixion of working class people by the commercial banks touches my soul and I raised the issue on the show as the discussants were talking about the election next year.
Mr. Jabour is a politician and I anticipated he would have been on the same wavelength with me. But in fact, his response was brief and he showed no emotion about defending these poorer folks. In fact, from the little he said, I get the impression that he was defending the banks as people who run a business. I may be wrong, but it came over like that to me.

The importance of Jabour’s response lies in the way people vote. I have contended several times on the Freddie Kissoon Show that the mistreatment of small depositors by the commercial banks will bring votes to whichever party shows an understanding for the plight of these working class folks.
People all over the world, not only in Guyana, will vote for candidates who display sympathy, empathy, understanding and appreciation for issues that are crucial to the existence of the working people. Let’s look at how the votes went in 2020. The PPP received 233,336. The PNC got 217, 920. The total amount of people that voted for these two parties is 451,256.

Those votes were not from the business community, petite bourgeoisie and the bourgeoisie. The bulk of those votes came from the proletariat and the lower stratum of the peasantry. A party therefore cannot win an election in this country if it openly sides with the elite classes.
Whether we dislike the PPP or the PNC, they are not elitist parties that tie up with the wealthy classes. Both parties speak to working class issues and even if we factor in ethnic voting, the PPP and PNC are not seen as parties that are distant from the world of the urban and rural proletariat.
More importantly, PPP and PNC leaders have their origin in the working classes and do not appear as elitist to the electorate. This is a reality that other parties need to internalise as early as yesterday.

You cannot win an election in this country if you do not embrace the world of the working people. If Mr. Jabour and others like him in opposition parties appear insensitive to how poor people are treated by the financial houses it could and will cost them the votes of the bulk of the Guyanese population.

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.