Some bold predictions are being made by the PPP that they might actually be able to take Georgetown away from the PNC!! Talk about a “man bites dog” kinda news!! You know the hoary bit of advice to reporters, don’t you?? If dog bites a man, that ain’t news…but if man bites a dog, then you got a story on your hands!! Yes…the unexpected is always news!! So, were the PNC to lose control of GT, a whole lotta eyebrows would be raised!!
After all, Georgetown was controlled by the PNC when there was barely a PNC!! After the PPP was split for the 1957 elections and the PPP (Burnham) lost, the man became Mayor in 1959 – just months after he’d launched the PNC!! That’s right, folks – Burnham was Mayor of Georgetown! It was an in-your -face move by him against Cheddi to mark out HIS territory! “You may rule in the sticks, Buddy boy, but I’m king in the bright lights!!”
And the political import of that boast was evident in 1962, when Martin Carter wrote “a city of clerks became men”!! That’s when even Civil Service clerks abandoned their desks as the business district was burnt to the ground on Black Friday!! Yep…even the poet couldn’t prevent that bit of literalism. BLACK Friday and SOOT, get it??!!
But you may say that in 1994 the PNC lost the Mayorality in GT. Yup…but that doesn’t really count, does it?? That was just a pi55ing contest between Dessie and Hammie to show who was (PNC) maan!! Dessie might’ve been able to expel Hammie from the PNC party because he had control of the party machinery, but when it came to the Party’s base – which Georgetown’s ALWAYS represented – that was a different story!! Green ran with GGG – “Good and Green Guyana” – and, as know, the rest is history. Sordid history, but history!!
The point about GT being PNC territory is reinforced presently by showing that it doesn’t matter who you put up for mayor – even a Pandit!! Once they have the PNC tag on their forehead, they’ll get the votes. And we arrive at the PPP’s claim that the bell’s being tolled for the PNC in their bastion. Well, apart from the usual braggadocio of political pi55ing contests, is there a chance of the PNC being eased out??
Your Eyewitness can’t really say with certainty, but if there even was a chance – it’s now!! To say that the city has gone to the dogs from the time of Hammie to now is just stating what’s visible to anyone who isn’t blind!!
And the PPP – having motivation and money – can actually fix what ails GT!! Are GT voters gonna finally vote rationally??
…folks starve here?
Your Eyewitness has periodically been reading accounts of folks “struggling” in our dear land of Guyana. It’s based on the rising “cost of living”. Now, while there’s no question the reports are describing a reality – your Eyewitness is thinking about how we’ve come to this, when we have some 83,000 square miles of that land – with only three-quarters of a million people!? The focus of the articles seems to be that the Government ought to do something about this situation.
And hey!! They should!! But in the meantime, what about us?? How about the kitchen garden that used to be standard back in the day?? Each of the hard luck stories your Eyewitness read about concerned folks who were living in homes with backyards!! Is it that they don’t want to get their hands dirty to plant some Poi Bhagee and Bigan?? And how about minding some fowls??
Now, don’t get your Eyewitness wrong…there ought to be a governmental safety net…but let’s help ourselves, shall we??!!
…the media mediate?
Well, now that the GPA’s elections mightn’t be held today, because of the injunction filed, is it possible the incumbents might quit imitating the PNC and allow a free and fair elections to be held?? Man bites dog??
