Charrandas Persaud’s villagers support decision to vote against Govt

By Andrew Carmichael

Residents of Adelphi, East Canje, Berbice, have thrown their support behind their fellow villager, Charrandas Persaud, who voted in favour of a no-confidence motion against the Government.
Residents in his village said they are not surprised by the decision since Persaud was bothered by the level of suffering they felt after the unilateral decision to close several sugar estates in Guyana.
Persaud was one of two senior Alliance For Change (AFC) members who did not support the Herdmanston Accord, which saw the AFC collating with the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) to contest the 2015 General and Regional Elections, which eventually got them into office.
He had enjoyed much support from the electorate in East Canje at the polls with most of them being former People’s Progressive Party (PPP) supporters.
Hence, when he supported the No-confidence Motion against the APNU/AFC Coalition Government, several of his villagers said he did a “good thing to make this country better.”
Noreen Bhagwandeen, who worked with the Rose Hall Sugar Estate before the coalition Government closed it in December 2017, explained that he did cast a ballot for the APNU/AFC back in 2015 with the hope that as workers they will be given a 20 per cent wage hike as promised on the campaign trail by coalition members.
“Charrandas made all of we vote for them. He couldn’t come back here if he did not vote for us; he had to because is every day he does see how we punishing since the estate close,” Bhagwandin said.
Another villager, Betty Chan, who has a business in Adelphi said since 2015 businesses have suffered significantly. She added that Charrandas’ decision not to support the Government came since he lives among the people, who helped to put the Government in office. However, they are the same people who have now been neglected by the same Government.
“Last year and this year are the worst Christmas I have seen as a business person in Canje.” She said she is elated with the decision their village parliamentarian took.
“Yes he is a member of the coalition but he is also a member of this community and I think he did that with consciousness. He is getting curses from the cane cutters every day because people looked at his face and voted for them because he is a Canje man. I am so happy that I can’t express myself,” she said.
One vendor at the Adelphi market told Guyana Times that she knew Persaud since she was in primary school as a school teacher. She referred to his am being a “good person,” who became a strong member of the AFC.
“Moses Nagamootoo did not deserve the Prime Minister position because he did not work the way Mr Charrandas and Mr [Veerasammy] Anamayah work for the elections for the AFC,” vegetable vendor Shmeal King said.
“When the coalition go in power they have Mr Charrandas in the back bench. Mr Charrandas do much more work that our Infrastructure Minister, [David Patterson] and they never make Mr Charrandas as a Minister; they just have him as a back bencher in Parliament and he feel it a lot,” King said.
“The people in Canje voted for the AFC so Charrandas is one of the people who put them there so he is right to take them down; I give him a big applause,” she said as she clapped her hands in support.