Lincoln Lewis’s sophistry is tantamount to his lies

Dear Editor,
Lincoln Lewis’s Aug 28, 2022 letter, “Govt must avoid repeating the fundamental mistakes that led to justifying the oppression of Africans”, really stinks. It is filled with unadulterated lies. It self-debunks and reflects a poor and failed attempt at sophistry. In fact, his sweeping statement that “By virtue of the sheer numbers, Africans have been the single largest group that has not only kept the nation’s wheels of production turning, but financed the state’s spending through taxes” highlights Lewis’s toxic verbiage. I mean, if this group were at any time ‘shut out,’ then how come it was “…the single largest group that has kept the nation’s wheels of production turning and has financed the state’s spending through taxes?”
Now, I do have some comments for this angry man, who seems bent on spewing putrid and racist sewage in Guyana.
First, concerning Government’s “…engaging in acts to shut Africans out of the Public Sector on claims of ‘ethnic balancing,’ or GECOM’s reflecting the reality of Guyana…,” I find this to be most ludicrous. I inform Lincoln Lewis that, going back to Aug 13, 2021, Adron Pieres penned that he saw “…the list of scholarship awardees from the GOAL programme, and according to his observation, of the 6,000 names published, there was an even spread between names which I believe are Afro-Guyanese and those which I believe are Indo-Guyanese.”
He detailed further that “From what I have gathered, I would say that around 39 percent and 40 percent of the scholarships were awarded to Afro-Guyanese and Indo-Guyanese respectively, and the remaining 21 percent to the Indigenous Peoples and those of mixed race… (therefore) the spread is a representation of the population, and there appears to be no discrimination in terms of geographic location.”
So, where is this ‘shut out’ of Africans? And I add, as it is with GOAL awardees up to this day, so must it be in every sphere – Guyana Police and Defence Forces, Government Media, all the Government Ministries, the Public Sector, etc.
As for the Private Sector, and there being “…no corresponding policy to see ethnic balance…,” I say ‘bull.’ On the whole, private businesses are just that. They are individualistic. And then, back in July 2018, under ‘their’ and ‘his’ APNU/AFC Government, “Afro-Guyanese entrepreneurs, during a Government-funded business conference organised by the “International Decade for People of African Decent Assembly Guyana (IDPADA-G),” uttered a clarion call. This came from African Cultural and Development Association (ACDA) Executive Eric Phillips, who “…advised them (Afro-Guyanese) to steer clear of the naysayers after reminding them that entrepreneurship is in their blood.”
Then this was reiterated by IDPADA-G Chairman Vincent Alexander, who urged the participants to work together to “pursue the ideals of the decade,” meaning in the area of business, as attendees were allowed to interact with key organisations such as the Guyana Revenue Authority, Go-Invest Guyana, Credit Info, and Small Business Bureau, etc.
Imagine this was under the aegis of ‘their’ Government.
No wonder Vice President Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo is calling on the members of the said International Decade of People of African Descent Assembly– Guyana (IDPADA-G) “…to explain how Afro-Guyanese have benefited from the $468.438 million that it has received from the Government …$68.438 million in 2018 and $100 million in each successive year, including 2020, 2021 and 2022 budgets under the PPP/C Government.”
Now, I can go on and on ad infinitum, but I will leave Lincoln Lewis’s balderdash, and now quickly address this festering sore of Guyana being deemed an ‘emerging apartheid’ state.
For this, I turn to what were some of the happenings in Guyana just before the 1968 National Election. History shows that the PNC-dominated Government made several self-serving, fox-like fundamental changes in the electoral system, bringing the electoral machinery tightly within its control, and reversing the open and free process which had prevailed until then. As reported in 1985 by Americas Watch and the British Parliamentary Human Rights Group (BPHRG), the entire electoral machinery — that is, from ‘voter registration’ through polling and counting — was removed from the direction and control of the previously independent Elections Commission. Then, in 1967, the National Assembly passed the National Registration Act ostensibly to establish a national system of registration and identity cards. This was a clandestine and subtle move, as it facilitated significant pro-PNC changes. So, instead of basing the ‘voter rolls’ on a registration process conducted by the Elections Commission, the new elections statute, the Representation of the People Act, provided that the ‘voter rolls’ would be “extracted” from the national registration list. However, (Mr Lewis), since that list was created by the PNC Government, under the supervision of the (PNC) Commissioner of Registration, the Elections Commission effectively lost control of the registration process.
Moreover (and you can check the independent report), the Commissioner of Registration became directly responsible, subject to the general direction and authority of the (PNC) Minister of Home Affairs, for all aspects of elections, from the extraction of voter lists through the operation of polling places and the counting of ballots. His title became Commissioner of Registration and Chief Elections Officer.
What was this? (In a synopsis) It was that the role of the Elections Commission was therefore reduced to “oversight,” and its impotent standby and listless performance of that function caused it to be aptly characterised by Lord Avebury in 1980 as “the toothless poodle of the PNC.”
So, I ask, what kind of state was the PNC creating then? Is this happening now with the PPP Government?
Let me go on, and bring back to readers that in this effort to create its own ‘apartheid’ state back in the pre-1992 era, several significant changes were also made in the electoral law itself. Two new methods of voting were authorised: (1) postal voting “if it is likely to be impracticable or seriously inconvenient because of the general nature of [the voter’s] occupation, service or employment, or for other good cause, for [the voter] to go in person to the polling place”, and (2) overseas voting, in which Guyanese living abroad could vote through ballots ostensibly obtained from (PNC) Guyanese officials in foreign countries. These new voting methods were obviously ripe for subversion by those in control of the election machinery, and ultimately proved to be so ‘transparently abused’ that they had to be abolished in 1985. By that time, however, the PNC had firmly established its position in power.
These and many other changes were in place for the 1968 National Elections, and what were the results? For the first time, the PNC was able to achieve a clear majority in the National Assembly; that is, 30 of the 53 seats, thus making a coalition with the UF no longer necessary. As candid observers and readers would later find out, there was a planned pattern of fraud. The PNC Government succeeded in registering tremendous growth in the number of ‘enrolled voters,’ totally out of proportion to population growth. This inflated list made overseas, postal, and proxy votes possible in significant, albeit highly questionable, numbers. For example, when two British groups investigated the lists of Guyanese voters supposedly living in the United Kingdom, they found that somewhere between 50 and 75% of these ‘supposed voters’ never did exist. These overseas votes, as expected, went overwhelmingly to the PNC.
So, it is grossly ludicrous to even think that you, Lincoln Lewis, are saying that contempt for the African race is a part of the PPP Government today. Up to 1992, when ‘fair and free elections were forced on the Hoyte regime, African leaders were targeting East Indians, and members of the African community did not publicly condemn the conduct. That epoch, to me, defined an ‘apartheid’ state.

Yours truly,
H Singh