Latest update April 19th, 2024 12:59 AM
Jan 06, 2015 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon
I love my country but I would be the first to admit that it is an enduring tragedy. I read how pessimistic Francis Fukuyama is about democracy ever coming to Russia and when Fukuyama says so then given his phenomenal scholarship you have to believe Russia is also an enduring tragedy.
One cannot recall any sustained period of democracy and essential freedoms that this country has experienced from colonialism in the 19th century to the end of the year just gone by. Francis Fukuyama probably doesn’t know anything much about Guyana but it would be fascinating to hear what he has to say about this polity.
There may be hope for this poor country because Fukuyama is advising the World Bank on a project of bringing democratic governance to small countries that remain authoritarian. Let’s hope he puts Guyana on his radar.
When we examine 2014, the story of Russia and Guyana grows older. Putin’s Russia offers little hope of democracy. In Guyana, the PPP has virtually killed off any thought that may arise from within its collective mind about political changes. 2014 was a bad year for Guyana’s future. In comparison with Ramotar’s other two years, 2012 and 2013, the year just gone by went in a direction that only increased the angst, sadness and pessimism of the people of this country.
So what was bad about 2014? No one could have predicted when 2014 started that President Ramotar would have been so silly as to seek to harm the country’s most widely read newspaper. But it happened and as soon as it did; I told all my Kaieteur News colleagues that what Bharrat Jagdeo did not do, Ramotar has done.
Surely, Mr. Ramotar could not have been that innocent over what the boss at Guyana Revenue Authority did. The presidency is ultimate in the public realm. The presidency is responsible for the impulses that the public realm emits. If a subordinate of the presidency in the public realm seeks to harm a newspaper and the Head of Government chooses not to intervene, then that Head has given encouragement to his servants to violate the rights of others.
If one were to take the total picture of power in Guyana in 2014 and asked which portrait more than others more graphically symbolizes the angst, agony and pessimism of the nation it would be in the person of the President. After his performance in 2014, it was clear to the Guyanese people that they have a President that is lackluster, lacking leadership qualities, lackadaisical and lost.
You cannot point to a single positive emanation from Donald Ramotar in 2014. The year gone by, saw the General-Secretary of the PPP, Mr. Clement Rohee, talking the most appalling and disrespectful nonsense each time he faces the press. But Mr. Rohee is not the President of Guyana. In fact Mr. Rohee is just a Cabinet Minister among about a dozen others. But Mr. Ramotar equals the nonsense that Rohee gives off and he is the President.
The presidential performance of 2014 was nothing but disgraceful. While his party and governmental colleagues were lambasting Anil Nandlall over a leaked conversation with a journalist, Ramotar’s best shot was to say that he wants the tape authenticated.
Asked repeatedly in 2014 by journalists on action to be taken on the report into corruption at NCN, he responded in the most awkward of ways unbecoming of a President. First, he told the reporters that he didn’t anticipate the question so he couldn’t elaborate. On another occasion, he said that he is still to look at it. On yet another occasion he replied that the report is on the NCN website which was a huge fiction.
A President would never want his nation to laugh at him as often as the Guyanese people do with Mr. Ramotar. Guyanese used to make jokes about Bharrat Jagdeo but when Jagdeo opened his mouth, he talked sense, even if you hated what he said. With Ramotar, it is CNS – comedy non-stop.
As the year neared its end, Mr. Ramotar was photographed at least ten times performing serious duties of state and in each photograph his dress was casual with T-Shirts and denim jeans. He met the Heads of the Security Forces wearing this style. No matter how liberal and unorthodox you are, the President of a country is expected to set standards even as high as when the stallion meets the sun (as Barry Manilow sang in his famous song, “Could It Be Magic”).
In 2014 there wasn’t anything magical about President Ramotar. In 2015 he is likely to bow out after a General Election is held. It will be magic then.
Please share this to every Guyanese including your house cats.
Apr 19, 2024
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