If it ain’t one thing, it’s always another – when it comes to race relations in our dear ole Mudland! We seize every and all opportunities to have a go at each other. The latest concerns the Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) – formed to deal with our fractiousness – sending representatives to the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent (PFPAD) from 14th – 17th April, 2025 at UN New York headquarters. But in sending Norris Witter and Ashton Simon, rather than calming the ethnic waters, they seemed to have roiled it up some more.
It all boils down to the perennial question about politicians and representation, which spills over in every forum where we show up. Now, coming out of the UN Decade of People of African Descent (UNDPAD), there are annual meetings in NY and Geneva, to keep tabs on what the countries with People of African Descent are doing about nettlesome issues – such as racism – identified back in the 2014 launch. The programme’s been rolled over for another decade, hence the 2025 meeting.
And we’re still arguing about who speaks for whom!! So, let’s start with that!! Used to be that, for the longest while, we insisted we were all “Guyanese”, and any Guyanese could speak for any other Guyanese. But then we became a bit more realistic when we realised that we still fell back on our racial or ethnic identities in deciding how we were treated. Brother Bob’s aphorism became the guiding light: “Only he who KNOWS it feels it”. And after quite a lot of reflection – and conflict – we decided to form the ERC to sort out matters in that area.
So, organizations representing us in all our activities in our national life – religions, ethnic groups, gender, labour, business etc – were mandated to send representatives of the particular interests, so that a “national” position can be agreed on particular activities by the ERC. The ENTIRE body would meet to arrive at that happy position!! And we return to the PFPAD meet coming up in NY, where Witter and Simon are gonna be sent.
Now, Witter is of African descent, and represents “Labour” on the ERC, while Simon is of Indigenous descent and represents that community. The nub of the complaints coming from some African organizations is that only Africans can speak for Africans. But Witter is an African, so what’s the problem?? Is it that only the representative sent to the ERC by African organizations – a Rasta fella by the name of Ras Khafra – can speak to “African” fora?? Well, that was tried before, and caused an even bigger ruckus!! Seems some of them think Ras Khafra is a sellout to the PPP for supporting them.
The only legitimate African is an anti-PPP African?!!
…of border security
With Mad Maduro single-mindedly proving he’ll stop at nothing to take over our Essequibo, we gotta be just as single-minded about defending our territory. Now, while we can’t rule out him sending troops across the Cuyuni River – via the bridge he just completed to Ankoko Island – nowadays, when it comes to warfare, there are any number of ways to bell the cat, so to speak. All the sabre-rattling, like massing troops and warships on the border and into our waters, must be seen for what they are – preliminary skirmishes to total war.
Another tactic is to hold that election for a Governor of Essequibo, which he’s been threatening for a while now and is scheduled for May 25 – the day before our Independence Day. He’ll probably come up with some cockamamie polling of Venezuelans who’ve poured into Regions 1 and 2 to “prove” his point.
And that’s why we gotta keep deporting new “immigrants” like we did with the 75, until he quits his nonsense!!
