THE International Day of Peace is observed around the world today, September 21. The UN General Assembly has declared this as a day devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace through observing 24 hours of non-violence and ceasefire. The International Day of Peace was established in 1981 by the United Nations General Assembly. A UN message states, inter alia: “This year, it has been clearer than ever that we are not each other’s enemies. Rather, our common enemy is a tireless virus that threatens our health, security and very way of life. COVID-19 has thrown our world into turmoil and forcibly reminded us that what happens in one part of the planet can impact people everywhere.

“In March, UN Secretary-General António Guterres called on all warring parties to lay down their weapons and focus on the battle against this unprecedented global pandemic. While the message is intended for armed parties, solidarity and cooperation across borders, sectors and generations are also needed to win this new fight against the worst public health crisis of our time. To mark its 75th anniversary, the UN has invited global communities to join UN75 in a global conversation on building the peaceful and prosperous future that peace-loving people want. As conflagration engulfs countries around the world, creating an endless stream of hopeless, homeless refugees, creating orphans and widows by the billions, and destroying capacities for development in nation-states, one is forced to recognise that man’s inhumanity to man is an ever-evolving phenomenon with expanding parameters of conflict locations, putting at peril the survival of mankind on Planet Earth. The General Assembly has declared this as a day devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace, both within and among all nations and peoples. United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres posited in 2017, “In times of insecurity, communities that look different become convenient scapegoats. We must resist cynical efforts to divide communities and portray neighbours as ‘the other.’ Discrimination diminishes us all. It prevents people — and societies — from achieving their full potential.”

He added, “Together, let us stand up against bigotry and for human rights. Together, let us build bridges. Together, let us transform fear into hope.”
The United Nations, comprising 193 member states, the private sector, civil society, academic institutions and individual citizens have all bonded in a global partnership, initiated during the United Nations Summit for Refugees and Migrants on September 19, 2016, with the goal of bringing people, especially the oppressed, disadvantaged and vulnerable, together as members of the human family.

This concept, identifying the world as one global human village, was propagated by Guyana’s Executive President the late Dr. Cheddi Jagan, in his UN-adopted “New Global Human Order.” His fulminations espoused the formulation and implementation of a new world dispensation, where access to the world’s bounties should be shared in equal measure so that all mankind could be provided enough resources to ensure poverty and want could eventually be eradicated from the world. In Guyana, the Guyana Peace Council (GPC), established by the former PPP/C administration, urged, in its message to commemorate the 2017 UN ‘International Day of Peace, that all peace-loving forces in Guyana and the world at large to recommit themselves to the cause of peace and disarmament, in particular nuclear disarmament. The council iterated: “We are living in dangerous times made even worse by the build-up of military hardware and weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons. Such military build-up puts the whole of humanity at risk and could potentially bring an end to human civilisation. The true cost of military build-ups is not simply the actual money spent on them, but the sacrificed alternative in terms of human development and the elimination of poverty, hunger and ignorance among a significant segment of the world’s population. The only beneficiaries of wars and conflicts are the military-industrial complex, which rakes in billions in profits at the expense of human misery.”

Peace is a natural prerequisite to human development that leads to the economic growth of nations and, if the leadership is grounded in democratic principles, eventual individual, societal and national prosperity. Guyana is in a state of flux and our nation can self-destruct through our human engagements, or lack of same. We no longer, in large measure, trust each other as our foreparents once did and unless, as a nation we begin to live by and honour the concepts enshrined in our national motto, we will forever exist on the precipice of national conflagration. God gifted to us a paradise, where we can live free from fear of natural devastating occurrences such as tsunamis, hurricanes, volcanoes, tornadoes et al. Yet we are squandering our blessings with rancorous behaviour towards each other. It is time to commit ourselves to the greater good and espouse unity and humanity, as opposed to all that divides us. This is the only recipe for our personal and national growth and upward mobility in the world map.