Dear Editor,
In 1908, in a remote and rugged mountain village in the Northern Caucasus, Leo Tolstoy, one of the greatest writers of the ages, was the guest of a tribal chief.
As the village gathered around the fire, the chief asked Tolstoy to speak of famous men of history. Tolstoy spoke of Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, and so on. When he was finished, the chief stood up and said, “But you have not told us about the greatest general and ruler in the world – Lincoln.
This story is to explain that a man’s good deed always outlive his bad deeds.
When President Granger presented himself as a candidate to the people, his message was one of national unity and social cohesion. He even set up a Ministry of Social Cohesion. But there is a huge gap between what he said in the past and says now compared to his actions. The actions of this Granger Government reflect a commitment to ethnic supremacy and ethnic triumphalism; and to expose this reality, one only has to visit all the appointments at the Head of Department level or Deputy Head level, and one will find adequate evidence that Mr Granger is a man of empty words, and nothing else. These kinds of actions guarantee him a spot in history 10 years from now: He shall be no more than a footnote in the history books.
Guyana will always remember Burnham, Hoyte, the Jagans, and Jagdeo. Irrespective of their good and bad attributes, I am now convinced they were committed to a principle of wanting better for the Guyanese people. I cannot say the same for Granger. I get a sense he is only interested in progressing the career of the ARMY boys and a small Georgetown-based Afro-Guyanese elite. That is why a top professional like Anand Goolsarran cannot find a job in this administration, even though he applied for several jobs.
Where is the charity of President Granger towards all the people of Guyana? Why this mean streak and dislike for people of a certain ethnicity that he seemingly cannot identify with?
Ryan Basdeo,
Student
