Category: Eyewitness

Beatification We spoke about the beatification of Burnham by his revisionist acolytes – some like Kissoon and Harripaul, newly converted by the opportunism of “the enemy of my enemy is my saint”! The common enemy – need one say – is the PPP. Well, it appears as we were writing our piece, Burnham’s hand-picked successor, Desmond Hoyte was also being canonised – by former head of the reform, Stanley Ming. It would appear that these fellows would leave no stone unturned in justifying their dancing with the devil. Who was…

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Amountebank is a swindler and a charlatan. Originating in the American West, it described those who sold quack medicine from the stage. David Hinds, who has lived for decades in the American west, and would be very familiar with the term, is a mountebank of the first order. The quack medicine he sells purports to solve the political problems of Guyana. In his latest quack offering he begins portentously: “For any society to advance it has to settle a fundamental question – who governs?” Is this guy for real? So…

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The authoritarian mind Few will deny that the 20th century might go down in history as the century of authoritarianism and totalitarianism. But there is an irony about this factoid that is generally glossed over: most of the authoritarian and totalitarian leaders were convinced they were acting for the good of “the people”. Check them out – Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, or Burnham – they all would be hurt if you told them they were doing it to raise their flaccid self esteem. So they were able to justify breaking…

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Poachers FITUG came out swinging against the AFC’s cynical and transparent moves to exploit the problems in the sugar industry. It’s high time that they did. And all who care about creating a stable Guyana should join in their condemnation. As FITUG pointed out, our politics gestated in the sugar industry. This was because the contradiction between capital/ imperialism and labour were most stark during the colonial period. But Cheddi Jagan kept his promise to sugar workers – even if Burnham turned his back on them – and in 1997…

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Epiphany? We’ve spoken before (well, actually “protested” before) of the proclivity of Lincoln Lewis (“Lincoln the Loud”) to bluff and bluster, not to mention ‘rant and rave’. So what are we to make of the latest missive published under his name? (We understand they’re written by someone very close to him.) In unusually subdued tones, Lewis purports to ‘evaluate’ both the executive and the legislative branches of our government, since he says, ‘lead-management of each is in different hands.” Thank goodness he spared us the now barf-inducing phrase, ‘new dispensation’.…

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Bottom feeders The PNC held its General Council Meeting (GCM) – but it was more of a back-scratching exercise – and then some! Corbin scratched Granger’s back, but when it was Granger’s turn, he went quite south on Corbin. Disgusting! And all the while, Vincent Alexander, the man who had mounted the most credible challenge against Corbin but fell to the machinations of the sycophants, sat poignantly in the audience. It was exquisite poetic justice that Aubrey Norton, who had sided with Corbin to oust Alexander and his team, was…

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Show no mercy And the beat goes on. That is, the beat of the APNU/AFC opposition to seize total control of the political system. After conniving to ensconce AFC/PNC’s Trotman as the Speaker and PNC’s Backer as his deputy, the APNU/AFC continue to educate the Guyanese people of the meaning of the term “winner takes all”. The term has long been used to criticise the British Westminster system of government we inherited. But nobody’s ever seen anything like this. Even the much derided dictator Burnham (Trotman and Granger’s hero) had…

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Roadrunner Politics Faith Harding seemed to have hit a raw nerve when she accused David Granger – who his wide-eyed acolytes Harripaul and Archer swear walks on water – of being ‘a stranger to truth’! She was referring; of course, to the stunts Granger and his godfather ROH Corbin pulled during the stage-managed selection election for the PNC’s presidential candidate. Harding was merely questioning the process: to say it was ‘outcomedeterminative’ would be like saying the ocean has water. From what Harding revealed, the process would not have been unfamiliar…

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Wilful ignorance One cannot blame ordinary people for being ignorant of some matters in the public domain – who can keep up with the information explosion? But what do you say about the ignorance of some gatekeepers of public trust? Wilful ignorance? Take the sensational headline in the Muckraking KN about Tender Board contract to the NEW GPC via information taken from the Auditor General (AG) Office. The Muckraker, we know, will stop at nothing to sell a few more newspapers and take a jibe at those more successful in…

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Avarice and greed The story of the dog and his bone is a good old fashioned Aesop fable of unbridled greed. Already possessed of a hefty bone clenched between his jaws, the greedy dog spied his reflection in a river. Thinking that it was another dog with a bone, he opened his mouth to grab it but his own bone fell into the water. The moral, of course, is that when you’re greedy and avaricious there’s always a good chance you’ll end up losing ‘corn and husk’ – or in…

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