It is obscene for the APNU/AFC to speak on the sugar industry
Dear Editor,
Today I speak to you on the contribution made by the AFC Member Mr Khemraj Ramjattan in his recent address to the house on monies spent in the agricultural sector, sugar being his main concern. His contribution – or should I say noncontribution – was a planned attack on the allocations made to the sugar industry. In his opinion, sugar is a burden on the economy, and the present administration is putting money into a failed sector.
In essence what he was saying is that the plans, whatever those were, that the Coalition had for the industry were far superior to that of the present administration. Well, those plans were the closure of four sugar estates and attempts to shut down the industry as a whole.
Startling and truly backward was the Coalition’s goal for the industry. I am speaking of an industry that was making near a quarter-million tons of sugar when they took office in 2015 to one that was reduced to a mere 79,000 tons by 2019.
But it is of utmost significance that we take note of the person making that doomsday pronouncement. Please note, it was Khemraj Ramjattan and his counterpart Moses Nagamootoo who went through the sugar belt and lied to the workers that they would never close the estates. It was they who told the sugar workers that they would keep sugar going and make it into a prosperous economy.
However, all of that talk soon changed after taking office. His Government soon forgot that solemn promise they made to the sugar workers, because soon after gaining control of power, they promptly closed the estates. It was an overnight 180-degree turn on the people. So for Ramjattan to come now and say anything about the industry tells of a man who has the unmitigated gall of a sympathetic Judas, or ever to open his mouth or face the Guyanese people!
Is Ramjattan out of his mind? Or is he of the view that Guyanese are stupid? Which is it?
But what Ramjattan is not telling us is the hidden agenda of his and the party to which he is subservient. Theirs was the clear agenda to decimate agriculture, sugar being their main focus, the plan was that, with its closure, the support base of the PPP/C would be brought to its knees, and with the rigging of elections, then the PPP/C would have been cut off from mainstream political power, never to regain political leadership in Guyana again. This was their plan.
Then to compound insult to that asininity, the Coalition installed a Minister of Agriculture who knew nothing about agriculture, far less about sugar, other than that which he might have seen in a textbook. To have done this is a clear sign of the APNU/AFC’s evil intention. Now that their evil plan has been exposed, Ramjattan is shedding crocodile tears that he is concerned about sugar. Utter hogwash! I say this man has to take those hypocritical antics someplace else.
So, I close by saying that, despite oil, Guyana is still an agricultural economy, and to neglect so great a sector would be looking at a disastrous state of affairs down the road. Guyana can ill afford such pitfalls at this time of its history. Therefore, we repudiate that form of backwardness as well as all those who think that spending in the sugar industry should be lowered. That is not going to happen, and may I add, this Government would see sugar through its difficult years back into the marvellous success story of tomorrow.