Dear Editor,
I was not at all surprised at your recent piece on the ongoing fiasco at the Skeldon sugar factory project and the government’s way to deal with it. I would have been surprised if things went well and the project delivered on the government’s commitment. If that happened, I am sure the President would take full credit.
This project was much lauded around 2005 and leading up to the 2006 elections. It was to be completed in 2007 and improve the lives of many people in the region. That was the promise at election time. What happened? It was late by a year and producing 92 tons instead of the 350 that the government shouted about from rooftops.
Now that the failure is clear and another election is about a year away, what do we hear? ‘Saviour of the people’ President Bharrat Jagdeo will come to the rescue and says nonsense like: “So even if it means personally I have to get involved, I will get involved to ensure that it is fixed… that it’s delivering the kind of results that it should deliver so that we can safeguard the sugar industry”; and “Corentyne will become a ghost town and I will not let that happen.”
Well the President was supposed to have been “personally involved”; that is his job.
Does he really expect that people will read these hollow words and let him off the hook? Does he think these empty words are all that is needed for people to forget this nightmare, and think that the government, under his watch, is doing a good job?
Who does he think he is kidding? The fact is he is the sponsor of this programme. He touted it all along and up to the 2006 elections was promising people a bright tomorrow. So the Skeldon debacle happened under President Jagdeo’s watch and he is responsible.
The President cannot want pre-eminence only when big decisions are to be made. He has to be in front of the line taking the consequences when there is failure. He should stop pointing fingers.
It is an insult to the intelligence of the Guyanese people for the President to try to distance himself from the mess and try to portray himself as the saviour. Where was he these long 5 years while this project was being mismanaged? Was he “personally involved,” and if not, why not? Did he just wake up yesterday and see a bungled Skeldon US$200 million project that can now devastate the community?
Why is it always ‘someone else’s fault?’ Why is it that the President always appears at the disaster scene as ‘Mr Fixit’? As the President, it is his job to anticipate and prevent disaster before it happens; not be part of the mismanagement then blame others, and try to use the opportunity to look like the good guy and the smartest one around.
This is just one time too many and it is time the Guyanese people held President Jagdeo to account.
Yours faithfully,
Oma Sewhdat
Malaysia
