With us Guyanese, our partisanship knows no bounds. And therein lies our greatest challenge going forward. It doesn’t matter what’s the issue, it always boils down to which party you’re PERCEIVED to support. And invariably, that boils down to the race of the individuals involved. But it isn’t as simple as that! If either of the two behemoths pick an individual from outside their ethnic base to show they’re “multiracial”, you’d think that’d be accepted as “inclusive”, no? No!!
Those persons are immediately branded as “tokens”!! So, you’d think efforts would be made to rubbish that accusation through actions, that count more than mere words? Like Granger picking Nagamootoo as PM in their coalition. Then he treats the man like a doormat, rather than giving him the extra powers he promised!! He just made it so much more difficult for inclusiveness to break us out of our racial straitjacket.
Like with the appointment of the five-person Board that’s supposed to advise our Government on using our Natural Resource Fund (NRF). The PNC’s already challenging the Act that created the NRF – and cancelled and replaced theirs! But, of course, the PPP can’t just wait for the wheels of the Judiciary to respond to every cockamamie legal concoction the PNC throw out. They’ve been going full steam ahead with operationalising the use of the NRF, so as to make that nominal 47% GDP growth rate become real – with real production of infrastructure and goods!
So, they’ve finally submitted the names of the three persons that can be nominated by the President to the Board. And, of course, there are squeals of protests from the Opposition benches!!
Earlier, the National Assembly had nominated and voted their one representative. But even though the PPP bent backwards – they have a majority – and nominated a former PNC MP and Bauxite Executive, the PNC shrieked! So, your Eyewitness leaves to your imagination the noises made when the PSC chose Ramesh Dookoo as their nominee!!
But let’s try to be objective when we examine the last three members, shall we? There’s Carolyn Rodrigues, Maj Gen. (rtd) Joseph Singh as Chair, and UK Labour MP David Lammy. Of the lot, maybe Carolyn and Ramesh may lean towards the PPP. But Barrow, Joe Singh and Lammy?? Jeez!! Singh has served in so many capacities, starting when he helped put down the Rupununi Rebellion in 1969, that it’s downright demeaning for his loyalty to Guyana to be questioned!
And Lammy?? The man has been a beacon for standing up on behalf of blacks in the UK for decades!! The PNC dare suggest that he won’t consider what’s best for all of Guyana??
Which of his actions has suggested a “sellout” to Afro-Guyanese??
…development
Your Eyewitness deliberately used the word “development”, rather than “growth”, in considering the progress made on the gas-to-shore project. The Environmental permit’s been requested of the EPA, and the public can now comment. But we know that it’ll be mostly those members of the chatterati, who just love to “virtue signal”. Their standards of “virtue”, of course, set by their “woke” counterparts in metropolitan countries that don’t give a rat’s a55 about us in the boons.
From where your Eyewitness sits (firmly in the bosom of ordinary stiffs!) he sees this project kicking off the Guyanese Industrial Revolution. At long last, we’ll be producing something that’s not a primary product, like sugar, rice or timber – which we’ve been shipping away since our creation as price-takers! The urea we’ll be producing from the gas is gonna be used in the agricultural diversification that’ll catapult us as a breadbasket for the region and beyond!!
More crucially, they’ll be employing West Bankers fired by the PNC!! THAT’s development!!
…Stabroek Market Square
Your Eyewitness thought he’d croaked and gone to heaven!! There it was – a picture of Stabroek Market Square – and it wasn’t filled with the flotsam and jetsam of our urban detritus??
Now let’s wager how long this’ll last! A week?
