It’s the season to be merry, but all across Guyana, thousands have nothing to be joyous about this holiday season.
All along the sugar belt, 4,000 estate workers – from Wales, Skeldon, Rose Hall, Enmore – have lost their jobs, and the Granger Government offers no support and no alternatives in order to ensure that they and their families would have financial security going forward.
No one doubts the brutality and the inherent racism of this Granger policy, which cuts even more deeply because of the historical significance of the sugar industry. It was sugar that created and built this country, and that accounts for the presence of the majority of the population. For this historical significance alone, cane cutters and sugar factory workers have a special place in the heart of this nation, and should be treated with much more respect and regard as a mark of our national gratitude.
The majority of the jobless are Indian Guyanese and traditional supporters of the PPP; and since its election to Government, the Granger Administration has had the Opposition and its supporters in their sights for what can only be described as a total and heartless vengeance.
The Coalition Government has reneged on just about every campaign promise, including its promise of ensuring the survival of sugar and the rice industry. Instead, there is no good life; no social cohesion; no new investments; no new jobs; no downturn in crime. In fact, everything appears bleaker than ever before, and with Granger hanging the spectre of a return to Burnhamism over the country, every chance of a bright future becomes considerably dimmer.
Rather than social cohesion, the current administration is ensuring that the ethnic cleavage which has hindered Guyana’s social, economic and political progress solidifies into state-sanctioned policies.
It is an environment that condones the vile racism coming from within the Granger Government, and especially from its female component. The “coolie” and “chatree” comments made respectively by Presidential Press Officer Lloyda Nicholas-Garrett and Education Minister Nicolette Henry have set back the global movement to have increased women representation in Government.
Where women vowed to ensure better and more honest government because of their understanding, compassion, and sensitivity to social and cultural issues, the women of Guyana’s current administration prove themselves a total disappointment in this regard. They are a setback to women’s progress in Government everywhere.
The obscenities that occurred in Parliament with the police entering the chambers to manhandle Opposition members, and the scandal of the US$20 million signing bonus from ExxonMobil are only the latest in a series of corrupt practices that expose Granger’s growing tendency to authoritarian rule, which is perfectly in line with the adulation of his hero, the dictator Burnham.
Burnham’s ideas and “vision” were all built on the fundamentals of institutionalised racism against Indian Guyanese, corruption, terrorism, and an absolute contempt for the rule of law. Granger is following in his footsteps so faithfully that his attempt at a denial of ever having rigged an election rings hollow; especially when, to all public appearances, he is preparing the groundwork to carry through on this Burnhamist idea which allowed the PNC to hold power illegally before.
It is Guyana’s continued tragedy that we have had no sustained political leadership with the moral suasion to govern a divided country with the fairness and justness needed in order to bridge the cleavage. The pendulum of power swings back and forth between the two major ethnic camps, always leaving one side feeling isolated and violated.
Calls for major constitutional reform that would provide a just and fair framework that would satisfy both sides through an inclusive arrangement of government go unheeded, so the next general elections are unlikely to bring about any of the peace, progress and prosperity that have eluded Guyana for so long.
We have failed to tap into, and fulfil, our country’s great potential; and even with oil, we will remain poor. It is not oil, or gold, or diamonds that matter so much as good leadership and good governance. Perhaps we can all make that our Christmas wish, and hope for better.
As we gather with family and friends to share in the seasonal festivities and try to push aside, for a moment, our country’s poor state of affairs under the mismanagement of the Granger Government, spare a thought for the less fortunate among us, especially the jobless and their families on the sugar estates.
The Holy Prophet Muhammad said, “A person is not a believer who fills his stomach while his neighbour goes hungry.”
