Home Letters The PNC’s bullying tactics know no boundaries
Dear Editor,
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and that’s precisely what took place when I viewed the footage of The PNC’s protest action at Parliament. It was such a despicable display of sheer lawlessness in immeasurable proportions that one had to stop and give a long, sickening sigh.
At first I really wanted to disprove what I was actually seeing. I thought that my vision was somewhat failing me, or that the videographer was just being histrionic, or something of that nature, but closer scrutiny of the video revealed just what was portrayed there: a senior Parliamentarian from the Opposition scaling the Police barrier and kicking the officer in his head during the process.
This was a reprehensible act, judged from any standard, and if I were the officer assaulted in such a shameful way, I would have arrested Patterson and have him charged forthwith. But this is not the case. Instead, the Opposition are now demanding an apology from the Police for the foolish actions of the officer. Interesting!
So, why are the Opposition so belligerent? This we shall delve into.
Now, you have to realise where Patterson is coming from. He was just rehashing an age-old dogma of the party, wherein they claim ownership and control of the armed forces and, as such, they can do whatever pleases them. It was Desmond Hoyte who emphatically repeated that “The Police and the army are my kith and kin.” So whether or not it was in an accident that the officer got kicked is immaterial to the argument; Patterson could brazenly scale the barrier and confront the lawman from the known standpoint of the “kith and kin” theory.
And Patterson knew fully well that he could commit such an atrocity and get away with it.
So, while the party is steeped in that bullying and thuggish mode, its mindless friends are holding out for their comrade in a series of never-ending excuses. The PNC apologists claim that the PPP/C, while in Opposition, did a lot of things; so, Patterson ought to be given a free pass on this one.
We are yet to be apprised of “the things the PPP/C did”, as per the shallow excuse of the Opposition, so I quickly drew up the following scenario.
Let us switch roles and place a Bharrat Jagdeo at the scene, and picture him scaling a Police barricade and accidentally kicking that very same officer. Would that officer be so calm about it? Or, greater still, would the PNC accept that sort of display from Jagdeo? I think not. We all know full well what would have become of Jagdeo. Rest assured that, at about this time, Jagdeo would have been hobbling around on a prosthetic limb, with the collateral inferno of the Indian business places in Georgetown. There would have been mayhem ad infinitum!
So, if we cannot countenance that foolishness from a Jagdeo, why should we accept it from Patterson?
Moving on, I would like the Police, who right now are behaving as if they are stupid, to reconsider the way they were treated by that party when Fineman was on a rampage. Those officers who withstood Fineman’s murderous acts did so at their own peril. I am talking about twenty-three Policemen who were killed at the hands of the notorious “freedom fighter” gang.
It is a known fact that the criminals were outfitted with military camouflage, and were provided with arms and ammunition. In addition, valuable information was passed on to them when raids were about to be made. Who did this? Or, who was capable of doing this? These are facts the Police should consider.
Further, as the lawmen were closing in on the criminals, aka freedom fighters, there were loud chants in the streets of, “Kill de Police! Kill de Police!” This was brutal tribalism akin to the Hutus versus the Tutsis!
Those chants did not come from PPP/C supporters; those chants came from supporters of the PNC. So, when Granger talks about the “time of troubles,” he should give a cogent explanation as to who were the intellectual authors behind those atrocities, and why 23 of our Policemen lie dead? The PNC need to stop behaving like sanctimonious gangsters and speak the truth.
Respectfully,
Neil Adams