I QUOTE from the Stabroek News (SN) editorial of November 16, 2025: “Dictatorships are all very much alike, whether it be Russia or Venezuela or a host of others.” I once wrote last year that I found the people who write editorials for SN to be immensely ignorant people.

Such a line should never be written by a person who was born in Guyana. Whether you are old or young in Guyana, you must know that there was a popularly elected leader named Cheddi Jagan whose elected government was overthrown by two countries – UK and USA – that we here in Guyana were forced to accept as democracies.

In the US, John F. Kennedy is seen as one of the US’s most likeable presidents, but that is in the US. Outside of the US, Kennedy is known for using American power to overthrow Dr. Jagan. Kennedy’s siblings, their children and grandchildren never had the moral decency to apologise to Jagan when he was alive.

So, SN tells Guyanese that dictatorships are very much alike. But what is a dictatorship and can we name the dictatorships in the world? Interestingly, SN only named two – Russia and Venezuela. With dozens of countries less free than Russia and Venezuela, SN could remember or maybe did not want to remember, that there are worse political systems in the world than Russia and Venezuela.

Anyone who is not an ignorant person would automatically shout out – the Middle East/Gulf governments. When Russia (under President Putin) was awarded the World Cup, there was no global movement to stop it. When Qatar was made the host country, there was a demand by some countries to move it because of Qatar’s human rights record.

There is modern-day slavery in many Gulf states. Russia is a superior nation to many autocratic countries in the Middle East. The ignorant person who wrote that editorial was too stupid to know about politics and government in the Middle East. Pakistan and Saudi Arabia should automatically fly out of the mouth of any human if you ask them to name a country that is a dictatorship.

So why were Russia and Venezuela the only two countries named by SN? Because that is the way we were brought up by our colonial masters to think about the world. And it has infected not only the writers of the SN editorials but also well-educated Guyanese.

Bertrand Ramcharran has a colonial mind. He was once the Chancellor of UG. Ramcharran divides the world neatly into democracies and dictatorships. Henry Jeffrey was a lecturer at UG. Jeffrey maintains that Western Europe is more democratic than the entire Third World because Western countries have liberal democracy.

Let’s put political theory under the spotlight. What is democracy and is it a higher form of governance than dictatorship? And what is dictatorship? Are there more humane instincts in prime ministers and presidents in democratic countries than in dictatorships? Before I proceed, let me answer the question by saying that since the beginning of the 20th century, there have been more humane instincts embedded in communist countries than in the so-called democratic West.

The communist world supported anti-colonial movements and assisted them in removing European empires. The communist world was a bulwark of support for the ANC in apartheid South Africa. The communist countries gave vital assistance to national liberation movements that were fighting dictatorship in the Third World imposed by so-called Western democratic countries.

Let’s ask some formidable questions about political theory. Could a country be described as democratic if it supports genocide? It is not possible in political theory to argue that a country has a democratic framework if it supports genocide.

The two are contradictory. You cannot be a religious preacher if you are an atheist. It is simply impossible because the books you have to preach from are from God’s work and you don’t believe God exist. You cannot be a socialist thinker if you think that human liberation is only possible through the complete domination of a capitalist system. A capitalist system and socialist economics do not see human liberation in the same way.

A country cannot be a democratic country and support genocide. It is an impossible confluence. Genocide is a crime against civilisation. Each human has a civilising mission to stop genocide and support its victims.

For two years, the countries that Henry Jeffrey, Bertrand Ramcharran and the Stabroek News describe as democratic have physically and materially supported the Israeli state so it can perpetuate genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza. Only a genetically defective idiot would admire such a country and I doubt even such an idiot would do it.

 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.