Dear Editor,
As a Guyanese, I respect the late Dr Cheddi Jagan’s anti-colonial struggles to liberate the colonized from the colonialists at a time when such struggles were sweeping colonies around the world. And for this he should be duly recognized, even if with an Order of Liberation award, now the highest national award in Guyana.
But I find it insulting to the intelligence of Guyanese everywhere that this man should be honoured for restoring democracy to Guyana in 1992! This is patently false! And what is worse, the party that actually benefited from the return of free and fair elections, as an act that should not be mixed up with democracy which is more of a process, has refused to work to extend democracy beyond free and fair elections.
The truth is, the late Desmond Hoyte, whose PNC was responsible for past rigged elections and stifling of democracy, was the one who took small but significant steps after assuming office in 1985 by opening up the country, and, under pressure from overseas financial lending institutions and their donor governments, opened the door for free and fair elections in 1992.
He could have balked and taken Guyana down the road to further ruin or, as was happening, slower socio-economic recovery and growth, but being the one who controlled the elections machinery he was the one who restored free and fair elections.
The late Dr Jagan, after failing at previous PPP-PNC unity government efforts, and using his position as Opposition Leader to bring attention to the need for free and fair elections, just happened to be at the right place at the right time in Guyana in 1992 and based on ethnic voting patterns, was assured easy victory at the polls.
That Dr Jagan was open to a unity government with the PNC at the expense of free and fair elections for the Guyanese people should immediately disqualify him as a candidate for championing the restoration of democracy in 1992. He cannot have it both ways!
The late Dr Jagan, the PPP and Guyanese of all races, however, were finally the beneficiaries of Hoyte’s decision to come clean with elections.
I don’t know if Hoyte could or should be considered for an Order of Liberation award, nor do I expect this to be forthcoming from the PPP regime which introduced this new award, but the facts of history should be clearly written so that our posterity doesn’t have to be trying to find the truth the way so many of us are trying to find the truth about the murky fifties and sixties. Hoyte, in a back-handed sense, was responsible for the restoration of democracy in Guyana!
All of that notwithstanding, it has to be pure irony that the PPP would come up with an Order of Liberation award and cite the restoration of democracy in 1992 as the basis for bestowing it posthumously on the late Dr Jagan, yet fifteen years after the PPP was first returned to power, it has been behaving like a dictatorship on several fronts. Perhaps to the PPP the concept of democracy is limited to free and fair elections and whatever rights and freedoms existed at the time. Deepening the process is not on its drawing board.
It still is the only entity that operates a radio station while hypocritically citing the lack of legislation that would allow others to operate radio stations. It has failed to call local government elections for over ten years. It has several bills passed by Parliament that are still to become law by the President’s signature. In fact, judging from a host of other factors, it has not proven that it is committed to genuine change from what obtained under its predecessor.
One cannot surmise on what the late Dr Jagan would have done had he been alive, but if what is playing out under the PPP regime is anything close to what would have played out under the late Dr Jagan, had he been alive, then he would not have been deserving of the Order of Liberation award. This is a mockery of democracy!
If there’s anyone who deserves such an award it would be those Guyanese who liberate their country from the strangling tentacles of race-based politics, of which the PPP is the dominant player and the PNC the subservient player.
Yours faithfully,
Emile Mervin
