THE material contained in this analysis has been covered before in several columns of mine. I will resort to its repetition in the future because it best explains my current politics, which is a complete break from the Frederick Kissoon I was before March 2020.
Just to let new readers know, I am responding to a huge bulk of accusations against me by Nigel Westmaas last Saturday in the Stabroek News. Part 1 was in the Chronicle yesterday (Sunday). I continue where I left off on the topic of the dynamic that transformed me permanently.
The letter pages of the newspapers and Facebook posts are replete with commentaries of who I was before 2020. The latest are Ubraj Narine, former Georgetown Mayor two weeks ago and Westmaas two days ago. Both men have quoted me from my previous political life.
No better example of how fast I am running from my previous political life is taken from Narine. He quotes me regarding what I had to say in the past. But this very man has looked me in the eyes on three occasions and told me he does not know anything about rigged elections in 2020.
Westmaas and I shared an enduring camaraderie up to March 2020. That friendship was instantly dissolved when in an email request to him, I asked him to denounce the attempt to do what he and I saw Burnham and Hoyte did – deny Guyanese their right to elect a political organisation of their choice. He declined.
I had unlimited respect for Moses Bhagwan and Eusi Kwayana before 2020. Both men in email exchanges in April 2020 refused to denounce the election rigging. One cannot imagine what happened to my psyche. These were people who shaped my politics. These men were part of my pantheon of heroes. Remember this column when Bhagwan’s autobiography is out next month. He will not say one word, not even one word, about the elections disaster that lasted five months in 2020.
I will never understand why people who comment on my political metamorphosis never mention or write about Bhagwan, Kwayana, Clive Thomas, Rupert Roopnaraine and Mike Mc Cormack of the Guyana Human Rights Association. Nigel Westmaas and hundreds like them have changed. We have all changed but they never mention their names. Why only me?
I knew all these people up, close and personal. These were the heroes of the long days and arduous nights for the right for Guyana to have free and fair elections. I have indelible moments in my relationships with these folks, especially Tacuma Ogunseye, whom I helped with an explosive chemical.
In 2020, my psyche was shattered and laid at my feet in scattered pieces. How could these personalities whom Guyana, the Caribbean Region and the world respected for over 30 years accept that Guyana should no longer have free and fair elections and that there are no philosophical consequences in one party in Guyana having permanent power?
I did not vote for the PPP in 2020. My ballot went to the Amerindian-based party of Lenox Shuman. But as the days unfolded in March 2020 and what I was seeing in Guyana, brought back painful memories of the long march of struggle against one-party rule under Forbes Burnham and Desmond Hoyte. As the elections disaster crossed over from days to weeks to months, I was not in a mental mood to reflect on my troubles with the PPP.
Those troubles should not have allowed me to sacrifice my country because I had running battles with different PPP governments. I was not prepared to allow narrow political thinking to cloud my judgement. I was not prepared to let my love for country, my moral conscience and my philosophical training be sacrificed on the altar of past events with the PPP. My country came first. I had a daughter and a wife in March 2020 (still do) and I did not want them to experience the trauma that I went through when Guyana had permanent power.
I know how evil permanent power can be. I was thrown off a UG bus when coming home after confronting a rigged student election on the campus in 1975 and had to be hospitalised. A permanent President in Guyana banned me and my wife from working in Guyana. A permanent President prevented Walter Rodney from teaching history at UG.
When I write on rigged elections, I think of how different Guyana would have been if there were no rigged elections in 1973. Cheddi Jagan would have been Prime Minister and Rodney would never have had a violent confrontation with President Burnham.
In Part 3, I explain why the people I so admired supported rigged election in 2020. Class and race are the answers.
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.
