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Nov 18, 2018 Features / Columnists, My Column
The first time I travelled the length of the Berbice River from New Amsterdam to Kwakwani was forty years ago. I was an Information Officer back then. It was my responsibility to report on the activities of every community in all of what is now Region Six, and parts of Region Ten.
My friend and now senior city councilor, Oscar Clarke, was the Regional Minister. With him was sidekick Stanley Hamilton, who was the Regional Executive Officer. Theirs was the responsibility to visit every community to ensure that money allocated for works was properly spent.
Along with other regional officials, they paid regular visits to every corner of the Region, meeting with people who knew what their community needed. Of course, there were things that neither Clarke nor Hamilton could provide. One such was the electricity expansion programme, but they always made a pitch to have electricity taken to every corner of the Region.
Health issues predominated in the various communities of the Berbice River, so the government established health centres and clinics in many communities. So it was that on November 14, 1978, I boarded a speedboat at New Amsterdam stelling where the mosquitoes and sandflies abounded.
There was no relief until the boat pulled out. But while I sat in the boat doing my damnedest to keep the pesky insects away there were people sitting on the stelling not in the least bothered by the mosquitoes and sandflies. This has never ceased to amaze me.
It was the same when a Land Rover I happened to be driving one day along the West Berbice road to the city developed a puncture. I came out of the vehicle with lug spanner and jack to effect the change of wheel. However, the mosquitoes were too much for me, so every so often I would abandon the task to seek shelter in the vehicle.
I had barely removed the lug nuts when a villager came up and offered to help. He wasn’t even wearing a shirt. He sent me in the vehicle and he did the job uninterrupted. The mosquitoes didn’t seem to bother him.
We left the New Amsterdam stelling to make the first stop at a place called De Veldt. After the usual round of Government business, we continued up river, stopping at many locations, Calcuni and Ida Sabina included, eventually reaching Ebini. Many people mix up this place with Kimbia.
At the time there was a National Service Centre there. It was there that I saw a large cotton cultivation. I saw milk being dumped down the drain by the gallons, because Guyana could not ship the hundreds of gallons per day to a location where milk could be put to use.
We travelled to Kwakwani, did what we had to do, then returned to Kimbia on the journey back to New Amsterdam. I remember November 18, 1978 very well. While visiting Tacama, the radio reported that some people had died in the North West.
Those days there were no cellular phones and communication was not as pervasive as it is today. By radio, the transmission as intermittent as ever, we learnt that something horrible had happened at a place called Jonestown.
I remember Oscar Clarke frantically trying to make communication with Georgetown, using the military radio that was at Kimbia. He came to tell us that fifty-odd people had been found dead. We started to talk about this horror.
When we reached New Amsterdam and began to receive copies of the newspapers, we learnt of the world’s largest murder-suicide ever. Jonestown had become international news. Every reporter from the various international news media came. People suddenly began to learn about Guyana.
I was in London after that event, and to explain where I came from I would talk about the land of Clive Lloyd, but it was when I mentioned Jonestown that people would gasp and say they know the place. Guyana had become a country known for the worst case of murder-suicides.
Today, many of us hardly ever remember this event; we don’t think about it, but there are a few of us who remember Jonestown and the events that followed. The late Dr. Leslie Mootoo had an article published in Readers Digest, because he was the pathologist that examined the bodies. He was the person who told the world that the death toll was an astonishing 918.
Today, I expect to see documentaries on the Jonestown debacle; people would talk about what some said was Guyana’s shame. Forbes Burnham would however say that it was an American problem transported to Guyana soil.
Guyana became the location where for the first time an American Congressman, Leo Ryan, was killed. I lived that part of this country’s history. And even as I began to think about Jonestown and those early policemen and other Guyanese who went there and collected large sums of United States dollars, I found out that a press conference hosted by the coalition government degenerated into a political rally.
Press conferences are for the media; party supporters should not be entertained, not even as observers. This was not the case on Friday at Congress Place, much to my embarrassment.
Reporters complained that political leaders sat there and allowed their supporters to harass the reporters. That left a bitter taste in my mouth and had people saying that had President David Granger been there no such thing could have happened.
Why did the leaders allow such a thing to happen? The press conference was intended to tell the public what the coalition would do in the days and months ahead. That opportunity was lost and the coalition actually alienated some reporters.
I know the exuberance of the supporters, but a press conference is not a place for such exuberance. A Partnership for National Unity has issued an apology and has given an assurance that there would be no repeat of such behaviour. I hope it is not a little too late.
Listen to the man that is throwing Guyanese bright future away
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