No one in the PPP will now ever be able to speak to the Jagans’ simple and humble lifestyle and urge its emulation for fear of offending former president Bharrat Jagdeo who is in full control of the ruling party, former PPP stalwart Ralph Ramkarran has said.
Writing in his column in the Sunday Stabroek, Ramkarran said that the “crass and unworthy” attempt by Jagdeo to justify the size of his mansion by the sea and his gargantuan post-presidential benefits have taken away one of the PPP’s greatest assets from its public relations armoury, namely, the Jagan legacy of a modest lifestyle with integrity and humility. “Jagdeo said that their lifestyle was luxurious. No one in the PPP can now ever dare to say otherwise,” he wrote.
Jagdeo, a former two-term President said at a press conference he recently held “I don’t believe ministers should have to live in a logie to prove that they are not corrupt… Cheddi Jagan didn’t have to prove that by living in a logie.” This was his reply when asked if he believed that his posh home at Sparendaam and the rapid accumulation of wealth by ministers would be within the late president’s ideals.
“I don’t think Cheddi Jagan, living in Bel Air Park at that time, in a nice house, was typical of Guyana. But Cheddi Jagan lived at that time there. Did that weaken his commitment to the cause? No. At that time that was a prime area. It was a big piece of land, nice house and it still is a nice house,” Jagdeo said.
Following the comments by the former president, Ramkarran said that it was a “sin” for Jagdeo to use the name of the late President Jagan to “justify his mansion, his pension and his Cadillac lifestyle.”
“The impression given by Dr. Jagdeo that Cheddi Jagan built a mansion, at the time comparable to his own, in an existing exclusive area is completely false and disingenuous,” Ramkarran said.
The Jagans’ daughter Nadira Jagan-Brancier had said too that Jagdeo’s comments were untrue. “I am extremely disappointed that Bharrat Jagdeo would try to compare his lifestyle to that of my parents, former Presidents Dr. Cheddi Jagan and Mrs. Janet Jagan, and defend his opulent lifestyle by pathetically claiming that my parents also lived in a large house in an affluent community. Nothing could be further from the truth,” she had said.
PPP General Secretary Clement Rohee became visibly agitated when pressed by the media as to why no one from his party had challenged Jagdeo’s comparison of his lifestyle to that of the Jagans and offered no defence of the Jagans.
In his column yesterday, Ramkarran noted that there were outraged responses by many people to Jagdeo’s statement, including from Clem Seecharran and, more indirectly, Peter Fraser, two distinguished Guyanese historians living and working in the UK. But the most telling came from Jagan-Brancier, Dr Tulsie Dyal Singh and Sadie Amin, he noted. Dr Singh, who conferred with Dr Jagan about his medical condition just before he died and visited his home, said that his own family home in Palmyra on the Corentyne when he was growing up in the 1950s was of similar size to the Jagan home. Amin gave a description of the modest lifestyle and home of the Jagans, including its leaking roof.
Ramkarran noted that as expected, Rohee, refused to comment on the controversy just as the previous General Secretary and now President Donald Ramotar refused to comment on Jagdeo’s insult to Mrs Jagan when she called for a restoration of advertisements to the Stabroek News in 2006.
“No one in the PPP will now ever be able to speak to the Jagans’ simple and humble lifestyle, and urge its emulation, for fear of offending Jagdeo,” Ramkarran wrote.
He had pointed out that dissenting voices have been stilled within the PPP. “Within the PPP different and more direct, intimidatory techniques exist. Direct abuse is a major one. Subtle threats of dismissal from employment are another. Most people have jobs with the party or government, which they need to secure for their livelihood. This is enough to encourage silence or elicit vociferous, sycophantic, support,” he wrote.
“Dissentient voices have been effectively stilled in the PPP, even though Jagdeo is widely criticized privately. This is the answer to the question often asked: how is it that Jagdeo has got such a hold over the PPP that no one dares to oppose him? I spoke out for years in the PPP, subjecting myself to intense abuse and isolation, until it became necessary to ensure that I no longer remained within its ranks. No one else has so far dared to oppose Jagdeo,” he observed.
The former PPP executive said that Jagdeo has taken over the party. “Jagdeo is in full command and control of the PPP. He has decided that he will lead the campaign as he did in 2011. His opening statements about the opposition’s beating the drums of race in 2011 about which he remained silent until now, kicking the opposition’s ass, and justifying his Cadillac lifestyle, show that he is in no way relenting from the boisterous cuss down tactics that he employed with such public revulsion in the 2011 campaign,” he wrote.
“Popular with the base though, this type of attack will energize supporters and shake them from their apathy. So will the raising of ethnic sentiments and the PNC’s past. But it will earn the PPP no favours from its middle class supporters, the depth and range of whose disillusionment has expanded over the past three years,” he said.
According to Ramkarran, the PPP may still win the elections and he said that the ruling party has “a solid 48 per cent” already. “No one knows if some of its lost support will return. Also no one knows what will happen to the AFC’s 10 per cent, having made the alliance with APNU. But as one businessman told me, the PPP will not have ‘happy’ voters. He meant that they would be voting unenthusiastically, merely as a defensive strategy to keep the other side out,” he said.
