Latest update May 13th, 2024 12:59 AM
Mar 01, 2011 Letters
Dear Editor,
I wish to thank Rachael Bakker for the letter, “The PNC will be judged by its ‘callous legacy’,” (Kaieteur News, 02-15-11) as it affords me the opportunity to further educate young voters about the true nature of the PPP.
I will rebut three points and ignore the usual drivel.
The letter stated, “During the time that the PNC ruled this country, Guyanese were thrown, terrified of being hauled off to jail without reason or bail, and being detained for long periods of time by the government.
There was no freedom by the PNC since there was zero tolerance for anti-government actions…All of Guyana was aware that the PNC government was drowning Guyana.”
The PNC will off course defend its record, but young voters must know that the PPP supported the PNC in those days.
After the rigged elections of 1973, the PPP acting on orders from the Communist Party of Cuba, declared support for the PNC.
In fact the PNC was under such tremendous pressure from the USA that the PPP’s support for the PNC was critical, and indeed Dr Jagan deemed it “critical support.”
Without “critical support” the PNC government might have fallen, but it was propped up by the PPP. By 1977 the PPP called for a National Front with the PNC, and by 1978 it was appealing for a National Patriotic Front Government with the PNC.
After Dr Walter Rodney was assassinated in 1980 the PPP and the PNC entered into secret power sharing talks.
So Ms Bakker wasn’t the PPP helping the PNC “drown Guyana.” If the PNC was so bad a government why then did Dr Jagan and the PPP wanted to join with the PNC?
It does not make sense does it? I now move on to the second point, that of election violence.
Ms Bakker wrote, “The history of Guyana under the PNC is plagued by election violence.” Well I do agree that there was some election violence under the PNC government, but off course we all know of the mayhem that followed elections under the PPP regime since 1997.
We all know of the crime waves of the late 90’s that left scores of Indian businessmen dead, the war waged on Indians on the ECD in the earlier 2000’s, the refusal of the PPP to seek UN aid to keep peace, the use of the narco death squads to combat criminals who had taken over Buxton, and the massacres of Agricola, Lusignan, Bartica, and Lindo Creek.
And since Ms Bakker raised the subject of election violence why don’t I tell young voters about the violence meted out to ROAR by the PPP in the 2001 elections?
The PPP, led by Ms Jagan, started its election violence against ROAR by holding a rally outside the home of ROAR leader Ravi Dev, who was out of the country, but whose wife and one-month old baby was at home.
So terrified and fearful was Ms Dev that she and the baby had to be rescued and taken to a safe place.
The PPP leaders “cussed down” Ravi, calling him a traitor and a worm.
That was the signal for the violence to come. The home of ROAR Essequibo organiser, Tajin, was attacked by a youth who was rendered drunk by a PPP contractor who had supplied him with alcohol. Tajin’s father was killed in the knife attack.
Later, at Herstelling EBD, a PPP organiser with gun in hand, walked up to Ravi and threatened his life. Quick action by some ROAR members and the police resulted in the disarming of the PPP organiser.
A few days later PPP supporters fired at ROAR supporters at Canje Berbice. Such criminal conduct by the PPP set the stage for the criminalisation of the state as explained by Professor Clive Thomas.
Ms Bakker made reference to Professor Clive Thomas’s book, “The Rise of the Authoritarian State,” to describe Burnham’s Guyana as such a state. I have no disagreement with Professor Thomas in this regard, and I trust Ms Bakker will have the same faith in his paper, “The Criminalisation of the Guyana State by the PPP.”
This is what Professor Thomas had to say about the current PPP regime inter alia, “The state became progressively, more and more transformed into a criminal endeavour…there was heightened privileges for the drug bosses, they became well established, well connected business persons…there was a consolidation of economic power on the part of organised crime…a consolidation of political power on the part of organised crime.”
He also asserted that the political bosses had a symbiotic relationship with the drug lords. So Ms Bakker, which do you prefer an authoritarian PNC state, or the PPP’s criminalised state?
Guyanese, especially young voters need not worry. Should you elect Brig David Granger as President, you would soon have neither an authoritarian nor a criminalised state, but rather a democratic state.
One that Professor Thomas felt should be, “leading the drive to promote social and economic development, to promote the rule of law.”
Malcolm Harripaul
Listen how to run an oil country
May 13, 2024
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