Dear Editor,
I know that speaking out may bring reprisals, but I cannot remain silent under the latest affront to decency in my country’s governance, the stated intention to lay in Parliament an Act to give Hamilton Green large amounts of the people’s money as an additional pension.
In the cited period of his power as prime minister, that individual did nothing to promote either the national progress or the plight of poor Guyanese. He possessed neither the high intellect nor the vision that distinguished LFS Burnham before that president fell to the illness of megalomania. Comrade Green’s street-smarts and cheap crowd appeal were used by Burnham to manipulate the lowest common denominator from which he rose. But President Hoyte’s attempted reform aimed higher, and that led to the differences recently mentioned by Green himself.
It is significant that Cde Green at the age of 80 still commands sufficient following in the renascent PNC to demand monetary reward for past services, over and above what he already gets in pension, plus current salary and perks as a top appointed official. It is ominous that the present leadership of that party, supported by coalition partners, feel they can afford to make a parliamentary display of disregard for even an appearance of decency in public service.
It will be shameful when speeches are made in the people’s highest representative forum, equating high service with monetary wealth which allows living at a scale that flaunts today’s primacy of materialism. Our Cabinet proved last year that they are in it for the money. Now they will allow Mr Green to join them in emphasizing, by their lifestyle, inequalities in the society and economy they were elected to manage.
They know they’ll get away with it this time too. Until the 2020 elections, and then we’ll all be condemned to an even more hopeless future.
Yours faithfully,
Gordon Forte
