Dear Editor,
I pray to allow me to share with citizens some experiences over the weekend.
They speak to real but worrying conditions existing in our beloved Guyana.
At a function on Sunday evening in the village of Crane, West Coast Demerara, I met a seventy-six year old Guyanese born retiree living in Delaware, USA. Painfully he related some experiences, He was unhappy at the sharp decline in standards since his last visit. He was in a hire car when a Police Patrol stopped it – after a brief exchange, he observed the driver of the hire car take a bag of rice from his trunk – the police took it and drove off.
Next he related that he spent part of his childhood in the Golden Grove, Nabaclis area and reading about the many contracts and the wonderful things coming from the Ministry of Education, he was surprised to find the school in the village in such a sorry state.
Finally, he lamented that as an ex-police, our police and teachers are still poorly paid.
After leaving that village, I noticed a convoy of vehicles – enquiries revealed that they were part of a large number of vehicles including sugar estate vehicles that were commissioned to take persons to and from the PPP Rally in Kitty.
One Linden resident told us he was given $3,500 as a meal allowance to attend the said rally.
The previous evening a young man came forward at the vigil on Main Street protesting the ban on Channel 6 – he openly related how he was asked how much he needs to read a Martin Carter poem at the event to commemorate United Nation Year of People of African Descent’, sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport and held at the National Stadium.
When the sum of five thousand dollars was mentioned he was told that more was available. He explained to those of us gathered on the Main Street Avenue, why he refused to sell his soul, but having heard of the vigil came and asked permission to recite the poem, he was allowed and duly did so.
It is clear, the PPP and the government are in possession of substantial sums to purchase support and are in the business of rent a crowd and glitter.
Buses were seen lined up from the Kitty Market to the Sea Wall.
The PPP has been in office for almost two decades, ought they need for such tactics, but they know full well that history repeats itself, and we would always have those to whom money is just about everything.
Kaslay noted. “Money is a bottomless sea, in which honour, conscience and truth may be drowned.”
Let us hope that such persons who take these incentives know how to exercise their franchise so as to avoid future indignities.
Yours faithfully,
Hamilton Green, JP
