I DO not read the online edition of the Stabroek News (SN) because I buy the print version. But, over the years, people would email me to direct me to insulting comments made about me by the editor-in-chief, Mr. Anand Persaud, in his position as moderator of the comment section in the online edition.

People would send me screen shots of things other people say about me in the comment box in the online edition of SN. Many of them I ignore because I have been around too long to know that, as a public figure, you will attract hate. As they say, “it comes with the territory.”

I was sent a screen shot in which a well-known letter writer who goes by the name Mike Persaud referred to me, Joel Bhagwandin, and Dr. Randolph Persaud as having no character.

In any country in any newspaper, that is the publication of libelous material.
I chose not to sue SN because such action is not within my DNA. I don’t know if Mr. Bhagwandin and Dr. Persaud chose not to sue. I don’t know who Mike Persaud is and I don’t want to know. This fellow accused the three of us of having no character because of our take on the oil industry and the oil contract. He says he is one of the persons in an organisation named Oil and Gas Governance Network (OGGN).

This perception of Persaud is replicated in many anti-government haters who refuse to see that one can use one’s academic training to arrive at an analysis that tend to see state policies and presidential behaviour positively. Dr. Nigel Westmass referred to me as a PPP attack dog. The SN’s editor-in-chief, Mr. Persaud, described me as a PPP lap dog.

I have no connection to, and with, the ruling party. I have no connection to, and with, any government office or any government institution. I am not a paid columnist with the Guyana Chronicle. I cannot be accused of having to close my eyes and write to support the Guyana Government because I am working for my pay.

I have used my academic capacity to make analyses based on facts and to draw logical conclusions. My analyses lead me to see the President of Guyana as a transformational politician that is going in a direction that, given my understanding of political economy, I endorse.

My training in philosophy and political theory when applied to the study of politics in Guyana directs me to the conclusion that Guyana is a democratic country over and above many others in the international system and the list includes nations that boast to the world that they are democratic and lecture to post-colonial societies on how to practise democracy.

If you think Guyana is not a democratic polity, then your mind is closed about those governments that have shunned their people’s feeling, shunned accountability and obligation and support Israel shamelessly, a country that has committed more acts of war crimes that any other since Nazi Germany.

My academic capacity allows me to conclude that the governance of Guyana cannot be faulted in a comparative context. If it can, then I would give anything to see that polemical outlay and to engage in counter polemics. I think all governments do things that a supporter may be rattled at and I think and know President Ali would welcome constructive criticism from academics that support his government.

I did not agree with the $2000 increase for social assistance in the last budget. I think senior citizen award should be more than $33, 000. I did not agree with water-taxis not being allowed to raise their charge by $100. I do not agree with our appointment to the Inter-America Commission of Human Rights, Dr. Arif Bulkan.

At the same time, my academic skills allow me to positively analyse governance, it allows me to dissect the forces directed against the government and conclusions are harsh. We have an undemocratic opposition which includes the Alliance For Change.
We have a hate-filled private media which is a threat to democracy. Guyana has a civil society that is an embarrassment to decent, independent civil society operations. We have political and social actors that use cultural and class judgements to denigrate the PPP and the government.

They oppose the government for hate-filled reason. People who label me a man without character, a PPP attack dog and a PPP lap dog are in no moral position to criticise me now or ever. I end on beating my own drum – I am far a more principled person and a multi-racial human than any of my describers.