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Mar 10, 2020 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom
Guyana stands on a precipice; below is the murky depths of dictatorship. The majority of Guyanese have never experienced dictatorship. They are either too young or not yet born to have experienced living under a dictatorial regime.
For many of them, dictatorship is just a term referring to unelected or illegitimate government. But for those who have lived through such systems, it was a harrowing experienced which affected every aspect of a person’s lives.
Between 30thSeptember and 5thOctober 1990, the Caribbean Conference of Churches (CCC) mounted a fact-finding mission to Guyana. Its objective was to assess and share credible information concerning various aspects of life in Guyana so as to present a balanced and accurate picture of life in the country. In other words, the mission came to undertake an objective assessment of conditions in Guyana and its impact on the lives of citizens. Guyana was then a dictatorship.
The findings of the mission were startling. They represented proof that political dictatorship affects the lives of everyone and impacts on a country’s psychological mood, human rights, security, the economy and social life.
The mission found that the doctrine of party paramountcy was entrenched. Racial cleavages and fear were widespread and economic decay and collapse was the order of the day.
The report noted that the country’s physical infrastructure was in disrepair. Guyanese who lived through that period would recall it could have taken almost two hours to drive from Timehri to Georgetown, at a time when there were not that many vehicles on the road. And the main reason for this was that every twenty metres there was a large pothole.
The CCC mission found that electricity and water supply were unreliable. Those who lived through that period would recall almost daily 8 to 12 hour-long blackouts with the national symbol becoming the candle. The colour of the water coming through the taps was like ‘swank’. The telephone system was described as obsolete. Less than 10% of the population, as I recall, had landlines.
The mission described the social infrastructure as being in a state of crisis. Schools were badly in need of repairs, and there was a mass exodus of teachers. The best teachers left for the Caribbean islands, most never to return. Guyana’s education system has never recovered from this brain drain. The medical system was similarly afflicted. Who can forget doctors performing surgical procedures with the aid of lamps?
Dictatorship has political origins, but it contaminates all aspects of life. People suffered human rights abuses, food shortages, discrimination and repressions. Political opponents of the government were hounded and victimized. Some, like Walter Rodney, were assassinated. Dictatorship is not a nice thing. It can be terribly harrowing.
Rodney, just prior to his death, summarized the situation in the country. He said: “The economy is at a lower ebb than ever. The national balance is at a negative figure. There is inflation beyond all acceptable proportions. Unemployment spirals. Social violence increases. The moral fiber of the society begins to collapse in a most all-encompassing manner.
One of the biggest issues in Guyana today among the population is how to get out. It is a society that is fast losing confidence even in its own ability to continue to persist, and a large proportion of people are seeking to escape from the society.”
That is the legacy of dictatorship.
Dictatorship thrives where there is a lack of accountability. Elections are the means through which people can hold their governments accountable. But when governments feel that they can do as they please and not be accountable to the people, then that is when the seeds of dictatorship are sown.
Just after more than 900 persons committed mass suicide at Jonestown in Guyana, Rodney linked this tragedy to the lack of political accountability. He argued that it was this lack of accountability which allowed for the creation of a state within a state, the suppression of news and the absence of an inquiry into the tragedy, immunity from the law and political interference in the judiciary.
Guyana is in danger of once again going down a slippery slope, if an illegitimate government is given license to administer the affairs of the state.
I will not be around twenty years from now to learn about the consequences of another dictatorship, if that eventually occurs. But I can predict what is going to happen. Governments which place themselves beyond political accountability end up becoming destructive and repressive.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper)
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