…at last??
Well, here we are…we made it to Independence Day #59!! Not bad for a country birthed under the curse that it was “a state and not a nation”!! We got the flag, the national motto and the national anthem – not to mention a national hero. But sadly, we’d become even more divided than the “land of six peoples” we’d boasted about in the lead up to independence. Some thought that it was the White Man who’d kept all that hostility directed at them – and once they were gone, we turned against ourselves. It’s a dog-eat-dog world, innit??
Anyhow, a happy Independence Day to you Dear Readers!! And let’s be thankful we aren’t in as bad a shape as some other countries out there!! Look at Trinidad whose leader once sneered to our president that “Trinidad ain’t no ATM machine”!! Well, they just had to accept a care package in food from India – once the poster child for poverty!! While it ain’t good form to kick folks when they’re down, your Eyewitness thinks it’ll be good for their (national) soul if they were to apologize to us for treating us like dirt for so many years.
So what about us?? We’re hosting an “all parliamentary” delegation from India that wants to “convey India’s strong message of zero-tolerance for terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.” But it’s good for us that we’re important enough to warrant a visit from these two old rivals. We’ve great bonds with both India and Pakistan – the country their anti-terrorism message is directed against –so it’s nothing personal for us to declare that we also denounce terrorists. And here let your Eyewitness add – this goes against both the domestic and foreign varieties!! We just experienced the former type in a comparatively milder eruption with the looting, burnings and beatings reprising our experience from two decades ago with some self-styled “freedom fighters”!! We gotta deal condignly with terrorists of all stripes and provenances!!
Another lesson we can learn from our parliamentary visitors is from the fact that they were willing to not only bury the hatchet over their fierce domestic political divides – but when it came to their country’s benefit vis a vis the outside world, they were more than willing to work together!! Your Eyewitness really believes we’ll only be qualified to call ourselves “independent” when we can free ourselves from our petty parochial compulsions – and stand shoulder to shoulder for our beautiful land of Guyana!!
We don’t want to belabour all the threats our country face…a madman in the west; a global struggle for dominance in which we can be caught afoot and crushed – or an Armageddon by nuclear powers.
Let’s quit with bickering, shall we??
…workers?
The cussed topic of Chinese workers in our country has cropped up again – this time because of a blurb on the status of the new Demerara Harbour Bridge. We were informed that out of the 1133 workers slogging away to finish construction for an August opening, a mere 134 were Guyanese. And that’s the typical ratio on all the Chinese projects sprouting across the landscape like Jumbie Umbrellas – ever since the Marriott was slapped together back in 2013.
Now we’re being told the ratio is what it is, cause there ain’t enough local workers – but your Eyewitness knows that’s only because there’s a mismatch between where the projects are going up and where bodies are twiddling their thumbs. Your Eyewitness suggests that just as the Chinese workers are housed in temporary quarters near their worksites – these same can be done for Guyanese from different parts of the country.
There will be creation the of jobs – but with the added feature of creating skilled construction workers who’re gonna remain in our country!!
…Canuck support
Canada has added its voice to that of America in warning Mad Maduro to quit with the nonsense of “electing” officials for Essequibo. But was it necessary since they’ll soon be the 51st state of America?
