THERE is a journalistic binary in this country – anti-government and pro-opposition – and it has taken journalism into the gutter. I am proud of how I shaped the Freddie Kissoon Show. Not a soul on Planet Earth could say that it is pro-government or anti-government.
The programme is not infused with my current political perspectives. I support the re-election of President Ali. But I have provided opposition guests with opportunities to echo their political elaborations.
Opposition MP Ganesh Mahipaul cited an interview with Minister of Education as the show being pro-PPP, but Mahipaul appeared three times and on each occasion, he had a mouthful to say against the government. Last Monday, the guest was Vincent Alexander.
Here is how the binary works. The private media target state officials and the well-intentioned plot is to frame questions that the private media feel would make ministers look awkward or embarrass them. But no biting questions are put to opposition politicians and civil society groups that are overtly anti-government.

This column will offer a few examples and those examples are so many that the rest of this analysis here is about those examples. The private media are not interested in surveying the thoughts on those in civil society. Each month, the Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA) issues a press release which is devoutly carried by the Stabroek News.

No journalist engages the GHRA and inquiries about its ontology. What issues have the GHRA taken up last year, the year before etc. Here is something I knew that often happened in the 1970s.
The Guyana Bar Association, the GHRA and many other organisations used to print little booklets and distribute them freely to citizens about knowing their rights under the law.
The GHRA, I assume, is in receipt of foreign funding (all Guyanese NGOs get foreign funding and funds from Western embassies here).

There is an area of police abuse in this country that the GHRA needs the attention of organisations like the GHRA. Last month, the Police Commissioner and the Attorney-General informed the nation that the traffic ranks cannot conduct random stops and request documents.

Since that announcement, each day, I repeat each day, I see traffic ranks stopping motorists at random requesting documents. The GHRA needs to tone down its anti-government obsession and do human rights work in general. It should print a booklet informing drivers to keep it in the glove compartment and produce it when they encounter random stops.

The private media seem to think that the only organism living in this country is the Government of Guyana. All the private media do is question state officials as if news only comes from the government. No journalist in the private believes that there is compartment in Guyana named civil society and many of these civil society groups have widely controversial existence.

Red Thread wants the government to get out of oil production. No journalist has ever questioned Red Thread why is that a sensible position. Many civil society groups, included Red Thread, called for the 20 counts of murder to be dropped against the accused in the Mahdia dormitory fire and instead a charge of arson be substituted. No journalist has asked these groups to explain this madness.

Let’s go over to the weekly press conference of the Alliance For Change. From the time, Nigel Hughes became head of the AFC, the private media have abandoned any interest in his political past. Even though Hughes resigned from the AFC in 2017 after a torrid retreat at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre, his reason was never made public and it remains a secret.

If there was any occasion to ask Hughes about this was when he assumed leadership of the AFC last year. This is the kind of story journalists all over the world hunt down. What happened at the Conference Centre to cause him to leave the AFC? Mr. Raphael Trotman wrote a book that informed readers that when the AFC came to power in 2025, he was not assigned a Cabinet position.

Mr. Trotman is currently General-Secretary of the AFC and appears often at the weekly press conference. No journalist from the private media has ever asked him to explain his revelation. Nigel Hughes was the deputy leader of the AFC when it came to power in 2015. Should he not be asked about the snubbing of Trotman for a Cabinet position?

The head of the PNC, Mr. Aubrey Norton, said the PNC will not negotiate with Mr. Alston Stewart, lead negotiator for the AFC on the consensus candidate issue. No journalist has inquired of Mr. Norton why this is so. The reason why the private media will not ask is because they accept their role of being anti-government.

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.