…jury out?
You gotta hand it to the PNC/AFC for their slick misdirection plays in our politics. And you know what “misdirection” is, don’t you, Dear Reader?? If you’ve ever seen those 3-card hustlers in action, you’ll notice they pull off their scam by making the “Mark” focus on some other object – away from the card they’re changing. In the case of the oily Opposition, they’re trying to focus our attention on everything else under the sun – except what went down at Congress Place last Sunday.
See that? You’d probably already buried that horror in your memory banks – hence your lifted eyebrow!! Yes…last your Eyewitness heard, they’re still counting ballots for the fifteen Central Executive Council (CEC) members – five days after the Leader and his Executive team were elected!! Is it because the latter were all African-Guyanese, and since this doesn’t look too good for a “multi-racial” party – as they claim – they’re trying to find a way to ensure some Indian-Guyanese are included in the CEC?? But, worse yet, have you wondered what happened to that “Inquiry” the PNC Elders were conducting into the allegations of sexual harassment by a top PNC activist Vanessa Kissoon against newly-elected Leader Aubrey Norton??
Have they interviewed the two principals? Or newly-elected Linden Mayor Sharma Solomon, who supposedly asked Norton to offer a lift to Kissoon from GT to Linden – during which the alleged armed proposition was made?? Your Eyewitness hopes this matter ain’t gonna be buried under no bauxite tailings…this is no skin-teeth matter. Never mind that the vote at Congress appeared to suggest that the delegates have already made up their minds. Violence against women is a scourge in our society, and we can’t have charges like these against someone who might be the president of the country not investigated. At a minimum, the nation must be told what’s the status of the Inquiry – and that the final report will not be a one-line announcement of exoneration or guilt.
Then your Eyewitness wants to know what’s gonna happen to the charges made by the two challengers to Norton for the leadership slot. Shouldn’t an Independent Committee of PNC worthies also conduct an Inquiry into them? Surely, two attorneys-at-law would’ve had enough facts at their disposal to make such serious charges about the arrangements for the internal party elections to make them actually drop out of the race!! In the meantime, we know they were disturbed enough not to even attend the Congress – and haven’t appeared in public to give their opinions on what went down at Congress.
Over at the AFC, of course, the new leader immediately embraced the losers – even as he battles the charges of conflict of interest!!
…pushing agri
It was just announced that the 400 acres of red beans at Baracara will be coming on stream. While, of course, we gotta knock the Europeans for introducing slaves and indentured labourers for their plantations in these parts of the world, we gotta recognize that those plantations were an innovation in the realm of producing agricultural products for food and other uses, like cotton for clothes!! Ironically, Baracara was founded by runaway enslaved Africans, and now they’re adopting large-scale agri!!
We’re waiting for that agriculture technology campus’ to be built here by India as part of plans to use technology to increase food production. India, of course, has been in the forefront of food production since independence – when they stopped the famines of British rule cold in their tracks!! The “green revolution” was part of that new technology, but had some downsides.
So, as we move into this brave new world, let’s ensure we work WITH Mother Nature! She can be bitchy when angry!!
…sitting around?
The Mayor and City Council gotta be pretty miffed of just sitting around their horseshoe table, rather than getting out into their wards to see what’s going down. But then they know the “dictatorial” Central is gonna be bailing them out!!
