Dear Editor,
1) President Granger’s new ten point strategic plan for hinterland development speaks, inter alia, of a Hinterland and Indigenous People Lands Commission and Hinterland Language Cultural and Sport Service, as if the Peoples Progressive Party had neglected these very important areas of hinterland development. May I remind the President, who revels in research and rewriting history that while our Indigenous people were marginalized under the PNC, the People’s Progressive Party ensured that they took their rightful place in our country’s history, that is, as Guyana’s First Nation.
Specifically, Dr Cheddi Jagan, the then president of Guyana ensured that Amerindian culture, art and craft, cuisine, music, dances and other aspects of their traditional lifestyle were kept alive when he officially designated September as Amerindian Heritage Month in memory of Mr Stephen Campbell, the first Amerindian to enter the Parliament of then British Guiana. This is quite apart from the several other support measures of the PPP/C Government to ensure that our First Nation people were able to access social services, viz education and primary health care, extended and improved infrastructure, support for the village economy, etc.
Amerindian Heritage Month celebrations also provided opportunities for Amerindians to display their art/craft, indigenous dances, dress and music in their villages and during the major activities held in the selected Heritage Village. These activities in the Amerindian villages and communities across Guyana also allowed for all Guyanese to participate and share in the culture of our Indigenous people. It was another way of bringing Amerindian people and their communities into the mainstream of national development. We did not have to wait until August 2015 to hear of a plan to advance development of our Amerindian people and their “Hinterland Language… Sports Service.” It must be noted that the rotation of the designated Heritage Village from year to year provided the opportunity for Guyanese, including our Indigenous people themselves, to experience and to learn more of the culture and way of life of our Amerindian people. It allowed them to market their villages, its people and what they had to offer in terms of goods and services. In short, Amerindian Heritage Month was also a medium for promoting hinterland tourism.
2) I did previously draw attention to the Constitution of Guyana and its several articles viz Articles 35, 149 G and 212 S which focus respectively on the very issues which the APNU+AFC are now seeking to highlight in President Granger’s strategic plan mentioned above . These include our “indigenous people’s right to the protection, preservation and promulgation of their language, cultural heritage and way of life.” I did further draw attention to the fact that there was already established under the PPP/C government an Indigenous Peoples Commission and that the latter body was already involved in its work aimed at addressing the needs and rights of our Indigenous people and enhancing their status.
3) May I add further that our Amerindian people’s ownership of their lands including the forests resources thereon and their right to plan for and to manage the use of their own lands; their right to say no or yes to requests to mine on a small or medium-scale on their lands are enshrined in the 2006 Amerindian Act to which our Amerindian people, most of whom live in the hinterland, contributed. Indeed, the 2006 Amerindian Act is a reflection and a representation of the nature and extent of the progress the PPP/C made as a government, and with the involvement of our Indigenous leaders and their people, in dealing with very important matters that address Indigenous issues such as their right to self-determination and improved livelihood ‒ in short, to be able to enjoy more goods and services and so enjoy a better life.
4) The PPP/C government granted Amerindian communities, at their request, Certificates of Title to their land. We demarcated those lands and bore the costs of the land demarcation. And where requested, provided the criteria for extension of their communal lands were met, we granted them extensions as provided for in the legislation. Our Amerindian people are indeed happy that they did not have to postpone their development while they waited on a ten point strategic plan now being presented by the APNU+AFC government
To date, 97 of the Amerindian villages have received grants of title to their lands under the PPP/C government. And the process of consultation aimed at meeting and discussing with other Amerindian communities that have met the qualification requirements for titling as set out in the Amerindian Act of 2006 continued right unto May 16, 2015 when there was a change of government. Many of our Toshaos and moreso the newly elected Toshaos have expressed concerns and fears that the APNU+AFC’s unnecessary political interference in the development of their villages and communities could well serve to set back the wheels of progress for their people. The PPP continues to reassure them that we would not sit back placidly and allow that to happen.
5) Integral to the acceleration of the development process in the villages and communities has been the PPP/C’s greater focus on economic activities that create employment and generate income for the people who must live and work in these villages and communities.
The National Hinterland Secure Livelihood Programme initiated through the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs sought to address some of the challenges of economic development in the villages and communities in the hinterland. These challenges included the inefficiency of some traditional farming methods and practices; a limited knowledge of managing non-traditional crops; inadequate diversification; an absence of food processing technology to cater for periods of shock, and the need for our farmers to develop an appreciation for enterprise.
These diversified activities led to the creating of more opportunities for income generation among our Amerindian people; an increased supply of goods and services accessible to the people, and resultantly, improved living standards in the villages and communities.
6) Other economic and social activities decided on by villagers were facilitated through the Presidential grant, an economic programme initiated by former president Bharrat Jagdeo for the first time in 2007. The grant which formed a component of our Poverty Reduction Programme for hinterland communities provided financial and technical resources for Amerindian villages and communities to fund social and economic projects of their choice. The APNU+AFC may wish to continue this programme which has worked so well to improve the livelihood of our Amerindian people even if it means using a different name as they have been doing.
Most of the grants have been utilized to provide transportation, viz, pick-up, boat/outboard engine, to support livestock/ poultry development; to expand accommodation facilities to support an expanding eco-tourism sector, to establish retail shops to provide consumer goods at a cheaper price to villagers.
In the process of working to realize these improvements, we have made considerable progress in terms of our efforts to attain the Millennium Development Goals for Guyana and reduce the disparity in development between urban, rural and hinterland areas. Included also are the attainment of universal primary education which our Amerin-dians have been able to access under the PPP/C government and other areas of development such as the reduction of child mortality; improving maternal health care and combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases.
7) The Youth Entrepreneur-ship and Apprenticeship Pro-gramme launched in June 2013 by the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs and targeting young Amerindians aged 18 years to 40 years stood out as one of those projects which came out of the recommendations of the National Toshaos Council meeting and which aimed at creating employment, building capacity in entrepreneurship through skills training and providing income for those employed. The project aimed also at helping to build self, family and the village economy.
That the 1,972 Amerindians employed under this project were without good cause or reason dismissed by the government speaks volumes about their love for Amerindian people and their development. What wrong did they do?
The only “wrong” the Amerindians did must be, in the eyes of the APNU+AFC, to exercise their right to vote for the government of their choice during the May 2015 general and regional elections. It was a right that they had fought for alongside Dr Cheddi Jagan and the PPP. Over $700 million dollars per annum has been removed from the economies of over 175 villages and communities as a consequence of this gross injustice heaped on our Amerindian people by the government.
But the government can correct this wrong, but not by training a few hundred Amerindian youths.
The young Amerindians want their jobs back. They depended on them. Their families depended on these jobs and so too did their villages. The government must re-employ these young Amerindian workers. Call it what you want: ‘Hinterland Employment and Youth Service.’ There can be no further excuses.
8) The establishment of the National Toshaos Council under the PPP/C government meant that no longer was accessibility a limiting factor in that administration’s determined efforts to dialogue with Amerindian leaders. We were no longer going to them only but they were coming to us as at the level of the National Toshaos Council (NTC) meeting where the President and his entire cabinet and chief executive officers interacted with them guided by an agenda which the Toshaos themselves helped to fashion. This is contrary to what happened recently when the APNU+AFC not only hijacked the NTC agenda but sought to interfere with the process for electing the executive of the NTC. Most of the Toshaos with whom I spoke complained of an agenda that lacked substance, relevance, depth, meaning. Many saw the five and a half days activities as a waste of time.
Indeed information in the public purview speaks of overt disrespect heaped on Toshaos by some who served as facilitators during the meeting. Talk of value for money: compare $33.4M for the 2014 NTC meeting and $60M for the 2015 meeting in terms of the output of the two meetings.
9) The tremendous progress in realizing improvement in the lives of the people in the Amerindian villages and communities under the PPP/C government must be attributed to the work of the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs working along with sister ministries, regional councils and village councils, utilizing resources made available by the government as we worked towards a common goal of enhancing the lives of all Guyanese and, in the process, reducing the disparity in the magnitude and pace of development between those who reside in the urban and rural areas of our country on the one hand, and the hinterland areas on the other.
In the process of realizing these improvements, we have in addition to the developments adumbrated already removed several of the obstacles to development, viz, the absence of infrastructure and social services. But there is much more to be done.
One of the biggest challenges for the PPP/C was to strike a balance between socio-economic development and the protection of the rights of Indigenous communities to their ethnic identity. In this regard, we were able to examine various options and develop specific policies and programmes with the participation of our Amerindian people and their village councils in order to meet specific needs and address particular concerns and so build the necessary conditions for development to take place. The PPP/C commits to continue to work with our Amerindian people, their elected leaders and all who would genuinely work with us to bring further improvements in the quality of their lives.
True enough there are still issues to be further addressed and challenges to be surmounted, but proudly I say to you that the 23 years under the People’s Progressive Party have brought much improvement in the lives of our Indigenous population across our country. I challenge the APNU+AFC to ensure that the progress to which I refer continues. Our Indigenous people do not want mere platitudes, tokenism or appeasements. They had enough of that from 1964 to 1992. Let the progress and development of October 1992 to May 2015 continue.
Yours faithfully,
Norman Whittaker