Dear Editor,
I loved John Willems’s touching tribute to his father-in-law, Eugene Correia (‘Eugene Correia was very knowledgeable about the interior’, SN, November 21), which made my Saturday morning.
We need more stories like that to remind us that the history of Guyana consists not only of the biographies of Cheddi Jagan and Forbes Burnham, but is made up of the hundreds of thousands of Everyman stories (I especially liked his note about the wedding) like those of Eugene Correia as related by Mr Willems (whose own name goes a long way back in our history).
I reluctantly point out though, that I can find no corroboration for Mr Willems’s belief that Mr Correia was once the longest serving legislator in Guyana. As far as I have seen, Mr Correia, who was born in 1899 and died in 1973, had served as a legislator for 16 (non-continuous) years when he died.
In 1973, two other legislators had served 16 years as well, although they did not have the good fortune, as he did, to have been appointed by the Governor to the 4 year interim council when the constitution was suspended and elections were not an option the Governor preferred to permit. A third person had served 23 years in the legislature by 1973, although he too was not nominated by the Governor to the interim council.
Two of the people who could not compete with Mr Correia for parliamentary longevity during this period were not only prevented from so doing by not being in the Governor’s good favour but also because for some of that period they were in jail at Camp Street and Mazaruni, perhaps because they were a little too strident in their belief that we shouldn’t have had things like governors and appointed parliaments.
Despite what I said earlier about Jagan and Burnham, one of those persons (23 years, jail) was Cheddi Jagan and one (16 years, no jail) was Forbes Burnham. The other one (16 years, jail) was my grandfather, Ram Karran (known through his life as Boysie Ramkarran).
I have now and had no doubt when I wrote the letter (SN, November 16) to which Mr Willems responds without referring to it, that Eugene Correia made a valuable contribution to Guyana. But how do we determine what contributions by which persons should be recognised? There are thousands of people in several hundred years of history who have contributed significantly to the development of Guyana.
Should we determine the form of recognition by executive decree? Would it depend on the power of the person making the decree? Should it be through letters to the press? Would the longest or shrillest letter win? And in what form should we recognise those contributions? By renaming airports? Streets? Towns? Would naming and renaming be done every generation or with every change of government (which seem to coincide)?
Until we come up with a way, by public conversation, to celebrate (beyond, but also through, giving national awards) those who we believe have made valuable contributions to the country in a manner that is consultative, equitable, inclusive and meaningful so that every Guyanese can agree (even in a broad way) without being intellectually dishonest that the form of honour is fitting for the person/s being recognised, the system we choose to use, and the recognition itself, will have no meaning.
This issue did not arise over the last sixteen years or so because it appears that very few people (and none from our more distant past, if I recall correctly) were considered worthy of recognition, even by national awards, then.
If Ogle International Airport is renamed for Eugene Correia or anyone else and people do not believe that the honoree deserves it, that person will get no true recognition from the naming.
If people do not believe that the renaming of something for someone was deserved, they will not think of the life and deeds of the persons so recognised when thinking about or saying the name of the place named or renamed for them. The new name will then have meaning to very few people and the rest will not consider it a part of their history.
When we do not use a truly consultative and inclusive process that people actually believe is genuine before recognising people by naming things after them, the only benefit that comes is that the relatives of those so recognised can tell their friends “Oh you know, so and so is named after us”. If that is what we wish to achieve, we are on the right path.
Yours faithfully,
Kamal Ramkarran