Dear Editor,
I refer to Lincoln Lewis’ letter in your Sunday, November 10, 2019 edition `The parties need to sit down and have the state ads matter resolved’, and your lengthy editorial response. Here is my take on this gentleman’s political degradation After Lincoln Lewis’ defence of the lawless and authoritarian reign of UG Vice Chancellor, Ivelaw Griffith; his repugnant embrace of Ivor English, his friend’s voting pattern in support of Griffith; his vulgar condemnation of two of the most dedicated trade unions in Guyana (UGSSA and UGWU); and subtle use of race in his support for the UG administration, it has become clear as a sunny day, this man can no longer contribute to solutions to this country’s problems.
In addition to the situations cited above, is his continuing vulgarity in denying that the APNU+AFC leadership has refused to constitutionally adhere to the requirements when a no-confidence motion (NCM) is passed. I am not interested in the reason for the sordid transformation of Lewis but for me the unforgivable input was his use of the race card in the industrial dispute at UG. After that repugnant injection, I no longer care for any relation with Lewis.
I will briefly touch on his introduction of this race factor before I respond to his idiotic interpretation of the state’s withdrawal of placements in the Stabroek News.
The two unions at UG have African leadership. They were exposing the role of Griffith and English. English is the TUC’s representative on the UG Council and currently works at the Critchlow Labour College at the TUC. In order to weaken the case of the unions and win societal support for Griffith and English, Lewis introduced me into the arena. Letter after letter in the KN and SN, he wrote that I was the hand behind the unions’ activities against Griffith.
The object was to show government supporters that an East Indian guy was behind what Lewis referred to as “confusion” created by the unions. Once a political activist like me was listed as an instigator, then, Lewis felt the industrial justification of the unions would be weakened. It was a horrible depravity because I was as distant from the unions as the North and South poles and hardly knew their leadership. When the unions accused him of insulting them by introducing my fictional presence, he still persisted.
Now for the controversy over state advertisements in the Stabroek News. Lewis has a right to think that he is smart, a title we all have a right to. Whether that is believed by others is a different canvas. His entire letter about the issue is as nonsensical as his defence of the regime’s approach to the NCM. He clings foolishly to the fiction that the CCJ never gave a specific date for the holding of elections after a successful NCM. He stupidly omits the fact deliberately that a date is naturally contained in the constitution – three months after passage of the NCM. But let’s move on.
In his rush to embrace the untenable position of his newly won friends in the regime he wrote the following line – “the facts are in the public domain.” Which facts? Objective reality or the fictions in his head that he calls facts? Here are Lewis’ facts that do not exist. I quote him; “ i) The contract between the two parties was severed/put on hold by SN when it refused to publish any more ads until the outstanding debt was cleared; ii) The DPI in the intervening period took its business elsewhere; iii) When the debt was cleared the DPI was advised by SN it could resume the placement of ads, which is a return to the status quo; iv) The DPI to date, based on its (non)placement of ads in SN, has signalled a disinclination to renew the relationship on term(s) set solely by SN.”
Even a school boy can reason better than this. Briefly, the contract was not severed by SN. It was by the government which reneged on the contract by either inability or refusal to pay or delay in paying. Secondly, the government did not take its business elsewhere; it refused to continue to do business with SN. Finally, the shamelessness of this man. He wrote; “The DPI to date, based on its (non)placement of ads in SN, has signalled a disinclination to renew the relationship on term(s) set solely by SN.” Those terms are commonsensical. Only an asinine mind would not understand that in a business relationship, I supply, you pay. How can that be seen as terms set exclusively by the seller?
Yours faithfully,
Frederick Kissoon
