Dear Editor,
I refer to a letter by Freddie Kissoon (SN 16.6.08) attacking me personally – my reputation, professionalism, and integrity as a pollster. My reputation as a credible and professional pollster has been well established and demonstrated repeatedly through amazing results that reflected the outcome of elections. Freddie’s latest salvo contains gross inaccuracies in relation to comments I made in a running exchange we had in Kaieteur News.
Many prominent Guyanese including members of parliament (from the government and the opposition), academics at UG (including Freddie’s colleagues), senior counsel, businessmen, and columnists (including from KN), my teaching colleagues in NY, etc, have urged me not to respond to Freddie and his attacks on my character. I made a vow to these decent Guyanese to cease and desist from responding to Freddie because I recognize, as they have advised, that the exchange is unproductive and will tarnish my reputation if I were to get into the gutter with Freddie. They counselled that I shouldn’t take Freddie seriously.
Freddie’s latest provocative comments about me tempt me to issue a full-blown response to debunk his myths. But I am a man of honour and will keep my word not to rebut his most recent attack on me. However, I do wish to note that Freddie engages in inaccurate paraphrasing and he has developed a proclivity to make pronouncements that are not substantiated or cannot hold up to scrutiny. In closing, I ask readers to look at the kind of language he uses to describe others – this is not the language (harsh tone and nasty words) you will find coming from the mouth or pen of an academic in America or anywhere else in the world.
Yours faithfully,
Vishnu Bisram
