Home Letters Is this the positive change Volda was talking about at Golden Grove?
Dear Editor,
If one is to listen to Cde Volda Lawrence’s speech at Golden Grove, it was “mountainous claptrap” and nothing compares to it but the illusionary mountains in the APNU official photo of that meeting that dishonestly inserted images of a Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) political meeting. Big difference! Jamaica has almost four times the population of Guyana plus the JLP has a popular go-getter leader – Andrew Holness. On the other hand, the APNU is a dwindling political force with a political leader who is totally clueless on how to move this nation forward, rendering the true meaning of their slogan as “FORWARD NEVER; BACKWARD EVER WITH GRANGER”.
But what is becoming absolutely clear is the fact that Mr David Granger is being pushed out from real power in the PNC. The competitors are being crushed as Cde Volda ascends to the top of the PNC and by extension, moving to control the APNU and AFC. Thus, her inflammatory messages at these APNU meetings to rile up the worst of the worst in the PNC. But her incendiary language on the campaign trail continues to confirm that if God forbids the APNU does not lose in 2020, this nation must expect a full-frontal attack from the PNC on the people. From the language of Cde Volda, if they are not deposed from power at the ballot box on March 2, 2020, then expect greater marginalisation, more corruption, and non-adherence to the rule of law and even greater policy paralysis and incompetence. So, let us get to business, as Cde Volda asked of us, and dissect her speech. Cde Volda confirmed that in 2015, all the votes cast for the coalition were done to achieve outcomes from the APNU/AFC manifesto. So, let us reflect on the track record and we can start with their 100-day plan.
1. Mr Granger, in his statement in that manifesto, committed to establishing a government of national unity and democratic renewal? After 4 years and 6 months under Team Granger, Guyana has now earned the status of being in the most divisive state in its entire independent history. Every day, I am talking to people across the land and what I am hearing is them living in fear as this society disintegrates. To fix this will take new ideas and time. If there is one thing that this nation, especially the youths, must penalise Mr Granger for at the ballot box, is the state of our social cohesion and national unity. It is one big mess after 4 years and 6 months under Team Granger.
2. Mr Granger in 2015 stated that “young people demand jobs” and he will create for them. Yet the facts after 4 years and 6 months speak to the loss of 30,000 jobs under Team Granger. What Cde Volda and her team did in the sugar belt was anti-human, anti-Guyanese and anti-patriotic. If there is another reason to oppose and banish Team Granger from office, it is this act of destroying jobs in Guyana.
3. Mr Granger in 2015 called for “safe homes for our women and children”. Yet, today it is the women and youths of Guyana who are under the greatest threat for their personal security because of escalating crime over the last 4 years and 6 months under Mr Granger.
4. It was Mr Granger who promised this nation an education system that will produce “citizens of quality”. What we are seeing instead, after 4 years and 6 months, there are more instances of school violence than any other time in our entire history. And these are not fistfights; these are “juke up” and “kick up” of our students and teachers. The situation is so bad that today, under Team Granger, we have cases of young boys going to school with modified cutlasses in their school bags rather than school books. Yet, rather than having an education infrastructure framed to attack this ignorance, we have a former Minister of Education (who does not even know her national holidays), calling school fights “a regular occurrence” without stopping to take stock of the crisis so that some action can be taken in these last days of the Granger regime.
5. Mr Granger promised this nation in 2015 an energy policy that will bring an end to blackouts. What he did, instead, was apply the INVERSE KING MIDAS touch on the electricity assets of Guyana that resulted in everything he touched turning into, well, you know what – just read Dr Walter Rodney.
Are these the results that Cde Volda was boasting about at Golden Grove? Is this the positive change Cde Volda was talking about at Golden Grove?
Sincerely,
Sasenarine Singh