Dear Editor,
In analyzing Ms Dawn Holder’s missive, ‘Guyanese should be proud that they have broken the bondage of far distant powers’ (SN 21.11.08) − meaning attaining republican status and abolishing judicial appeals to the impartial Privy Council – I offered some guided, probing questions to help readers make sense of her position on breaking the bond with England in ‘What were the reasons for breaking with England and the Privy Council?’ (SN 22.11.08). I did not offer my own judgment on political independence and I challenge Ms Holder to quote where I offered my subjective perspective on the issue. She misinterprets my response.
I merely related general findings of polls conducted in Guyana on the subject and the views of Guyanese living in colonial territories that still retain dependent status on the UK and are unwilling to break from that relationship. What I stated was: “I am not sure whether breaking from England was a blessing or a curse.” In my travels in dependent territories, none support a break from England. A referendum in Bermuda rejected independence. Also, the people of Turks and Caicos, Anguilla, the British Virgin Islands, Gibraltar, etc, reject independence. Analogously, the Dutch, French, and American territories have also rejected full independence. Ms Holder must know that Barbados (and Jamaica) have talked for years of holding a plebiscite on doing away with the Queen as head of state. It has still not been attempted.
In her response to my letter, ‘Lawyers in the region have distinguished themselves internationally’ (SN 3.12.08), Ms Holder did not answer any of the questions I posed on Guyana’s independent status. I suggested a serious probing study was needed to provide the real reasons behind independence, republican status and the break with the Privy Council.
When analyzing a subject or issue, it is necessary to detach oneself from the discussion so as not to give a subjective and or emotional response to questions. An answer requires supporting or distancing oneself from the oppressive dictatorship that governed Guyana. I sense Ms Holder does not want to commit herself to a position on the dictatorship. Therefore, she remains very evasive in relation to my queries.
I never suggested we cannot run our own destiny as charged by Ms Holder and I never said I support continued colonial status. Invoking the names of several legal luminaries does not answer any of the questions I posed. In fact noting the affiliation of powerful legal minds to the Privy Council supports the position of eleven Caricom states to retain the PC as their final court of appeal. Incidentally, Karl Hudson Philips and Dr Fenton Ramsahoye, both former Attorney Generals and QCs, support continued ties with the PC and reject the CCJ. Most of the lawyers in Trinidad, as indeed throughout the Caribbean, also reject the CCJ.
There is no denying that with independence came certain benefits for the new elite, including new symbols and titles. But to say we created our own symbols, have holidays for local cultural and religious festivals, nationalized banks, put Guyanese to head various agencies, have our own currency, coined mottoes, and proudly declared that Burnham moulded our destiny, etc, does not meaningfully answer any of the questions above. Does Ms Holder really believe that Guyanese were fed, clothed, and housed under the PNC and that the small man was the real man? Let her try advocating those slogans in Guyana and see how Guyanese respond! Ms Holder should also look at some of the negatives that came with independence – the squalid slums, increasing crime, drop in the value of the dollar, rise in poverty, collapsing infrastructure, poor governance, etc. She seems to have forgotten that the inability to eat roti, channa, potatoes, dhal and other basic foods and to obtain paraphernalia associated with religious practices characterized life under independent rule.
Contrary to what Ms Holder penned, I am not rooted in the colonial past and I never questioned our ability to run our own destiny. I am a pragmatist and objective political analyst which requires an open mind to look at all angles of an issue before making a judgment. In light of the way Guyana has been governed since independence, one has to take an in-depth view of the issue and not respond emotionally.
I should note that political theorists, developmental economists, and sociologists have studied the issue raised by Ms Holder. The general consensus is that most countries have been worse off since independence. The late Prof William McCord travelled all over Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean and concluded in his studies on the subject that only India and the south-east Asian nations have really made progress since independence. He found the quality of life has declined substantially in most countries since they obtained independence. I think Barbados and Antigua, among a few other nations, can be added to the list. Marxist thinker Bogdan Denitch of Yugoslavia also concluded that political independence did not benefit all countries. I recall reading a study of Prof Clive Thomas showing Guyanese were worse off under the dictatorship than under colonial rule.
Yours faithfully,
Vishnu Bisram
