WE can start with the Stabroek News (SN) late in 2024 which wrote that I am the latest hire of the PPP. We can add to this, the second accusation in the form of a definitive statement in a letter to the press by President of the Guyana Press Association, Nazima Ragubhir last year, about me having a paymaster.
Last year, dye-in the wool spokesperson for the Mulatto/Creole class and SN’s monthly columnist, Nigel Westmaas referred to me as a PPP attack dog. In 2023, editor-in-chief of SN called me a PPP lap dog.
This thing about me being paid, having a paymaster or being hired began in 2023 with Glen Lall. After our confrontation over Lall’s assertion that there is apartheid in Guyana, he went on one of his “tik taak” shows and declared that I am getting millions from Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo.
Here are some facts for Guyanese in and out of Guyana to reflect on. I have not spoken to Mr. Jagdeo since the year 2000. I have not seen in person, Mr. Jagdeo, since 2020. If Mr. Jagdeo has aged or remained young after 24 years when I last saw him, I would not be able to make even an infinitesimal comment because you can only offer such an opinion when you see the person in the flesh. Of course, I see Mr. Jagdeo’s image in the newspapers and on television but to tell if a person aged or not you have to see them closely.
If I am getting millions from Jagdeo, I do not know where it is going after I receive it and I do not know or haven’t met the person through which I receive the millions. I am waiting for my $100,000 to buy two things from it. One is a bicycle. For years now I do my matutinal exercise in the National Park by riding. The bicycle is old without brakes but it still served me until last November.
I usually lock the bike to a small wooden building after I leave. One day in November last year, I came and saw the bike totally covered in white paint. Apparently, the workers painted the building and since they didn’t know who owned the bike to unlock it, the paint flowed all over the cycle. It looks terrible and disgraceful.
The second thing I will buy with the $100, 000 are two pairs of car tyres. Twice last year, I came off the Eve Leary beach with my dog to be greeted with a flat tyre. Three times last year, I am ready to leave home but I got a flat. The vulcanizing shop I patronised advised that all four tyres need to be replaced. So why am I riding a painted-up bike and enduring tyre flatness when Jagdeo is giving me millions?
I guess Ms. Raghubir knows who my paymaster is. I wonder if she cares to tell us who hers is. And if I am a hired hand as SN exclaimed then who I am reporting to and would SN care to tell me which government department I fall under? It cannot be Department of Public Information because there is no paper trail that I am paid by the Chronicle.
Of course, I don’t have to go to the Chronicle to collect the money; I could go elsewhere. But where is that elsewhere? No one in any government department has seen me since Dr. Ali became president going every month to collect a cheque. Once Frederick Kissoon goes to an office every month to collect money, it would be all over social media, the private newspapers and the total public space in Guyana.
There is, of course, the pyrotechnical fact that I have no attachment whatsoever to any state related office whether small or large. I go to the National Park each morning for almost 25 years now but no one has invited me to sit on the Board of Directors of the Park. I have spent my entire life wandering around the Georgetown seawall but no one invited me on the board of the Georgetown Enhancement Committee that is in charge of the seawall.
If I am a hired gun why is GHK Lall not one? For ten years now, Dr. Alissa Trotz has been lambasting the government in her column, “In The Diaspora” in SN, but I have not heard anyone from government circles named her as a lap dog or attack dog. PPP leaders have not referred to Chris Ram as an opposition lap dog. I close by openly saying that I write in support of the presidency of Guyana because the anti-government world in Guyana, the private media and certain civil society groups have not even an ounce of moral redemption.
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.