Dear Editor,
Mr Loris Heywood’s requests the list of names of Christian organisations and leaders that the Leader of the Opposition and the PPP met before making recommendations of the six nominees for potential Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM).
Heywood is of the view that the PPP only met with members of the Hindu and Islamic communities, but not from the Christian community. Heywood made this unsubstantiated conclusion from what he said were “pictorials of meetings held by the PPP.” The pictorials offer no such evidence to draw this conclusion. As an academic, I can say without a fear of contradiction, the pictorials offer no such evidence and as such Heywood is incorrect in his claim of anti-Christian bias.
Is Mr Heywood operating out of a narrow ethnic mind-set? Could this be an idiotic conclusion? How did he know that the members in attendance at those meetings were Hindus and Muslims and not Christians? None of the attendees had badges saying they are Hindus or Muslims, or “not a Christian”. As far as the public knows, the PPP meetings were not billed as “only for Hindus and Muslims” or “not for Christians”. Did Heywood see banners contradicting this statement? Were people excluded at the PPP meetings on the basis of religion? Did Heywood, presumably a Christian, attempted to attend a meeting and was denied entry?
The PPP should have rebutted or debunked Heywood’s assertion.
Heywood asked for names of people, organisations and attendees at the meetings that Jagdeo and or the PPP had before making his list of nominees. Is Heywood for real? Confidentiality will render such a request implausible.
Generally, in Guyana, parties tend to have open public meetings. No one is officially excluded on account of ethnicity or religion. But because of the racial division of the society, the public chooses to attend or not to attend meetings based on racial affiliation – PPP perceived as de facto Indian/Amerindian, and PNC as African. Not all Indians are Hindus and/or Muslims. The Indian community subscribes to varied religious faiths. So a broad conclusion of religious background of attendees at a PPP meeting cannot be drawn unless Heywood interviewed almost all of them. I fully support the view that there should be no religious or ethnic bias in the selection of nominees, if in any activity. But since May 2015, the country has become racialised because of Government policy. The Government gives preference to its ethnic supporters in all facets of activities.
Yours faithfully,
Vishnu Bisram
