Dear Editor,
After seeing the video of Charandass Persaud, who at the time of its recording, was Guyana’s High Commissioner to India, verbally abusing Ms. Sonya Ghosh, a female who was attempting to feed a stray dog and bargaining in front of a witness for a place for the dog to stay, there will undoubtedly be a no-confidence vote against him to ever hold a position in government or elsewhere. Every normal Guyanese would be cringing and humiliated to know that this video is now available and circulating on social media for the world to witness. His behaviour was definitely unbefitting of an ambassador. It is crude and common behaviour and would tend to make some people in the population act in a similar fashion. Dr. Cheddi Jagan would turn in his grave because such an event would be unimaginable in his time.
Regardless of the failures of the PNC, they never had in their midst officials who would create public spectacles and portray anything less than refinement and dignity. The Women and Gender Equality Com-mission described their view of the incident mildly, by saying that they were utterly dismayed at Persaud’s conduct. His behaviour was despicable; ghoulish. It is a disgrace to all Guyanese and especially our menfolk, that this might appear to be acceptable and perhaps regular conduct by males within our society. Persaud should not have even been appointed to such a supreme post of High Commissioner because he was obviously devoid of the background and exposure that was vital for such a position. It would err on the side of it being a reward for his key role in bringing the PPP/C party to power. Besides Persaud unleashing a verbal assault on a female, she was a person of his ethnicity, in a country where his ancestors came from. He also ungraciously attacked the hosting country by attacking one of its citizens. Actually, we have reached to this stage because of how leaders and national institutions have failed to respond to gender inequalities and gender violence against females. Building the economy has become the priority with the production of oil, to the detriment of the improvement of other vital functions in the country.
Persaud’s sexist and derogatory remarks to Ghosh are not the first of their kind perpetrated by governmental representatives, within recent times. In March 2022, it was alleged by a female security guard stationed at the home of the ex- Chancellor of the Judiciary, that she was spat on and verbally abused by his son. The case failed to reach the prosecutorial level. Just in April of 2022, it was reported that Minister of Local and Regional Development, Nigel Dharamlall was accused of sexual harassment by a 22 year old New York based female. In the early months of 2021, Opposition Member of Parliament Tabitha Sarabo-Halley reported that she was physically assaulted in the corridors of the Arthur Chung Conference Centre by Public Affairs Minister Kwame McKoy. Seven years ago, there was the dismissal of the then Health Minister Dr. Bheri Ramsaran in the Donald Ramotar government, over his slap threat directed at female rights activist Sherlina Nageer. It is not only the PPP/C Party which has been guilty of misogynistic practices. Parliamentarian Sherod Duncan’s song/ video on Facebook, titled “Priya is a wild hog”, released in the latter part of 2021, was scandalous. In 2017, the Bishops’ High School’s principal, Winifred Ellis, accused her female students of being slack and loose, after a male teacher was accused of sexually abusing several girls of the school. The victims were made to feel guilty. Many of the incidents aforementioned, occurred in places that one would expect would radiate reverential status. None of the perpetrators of these repugnant acts have been convicted and the Director of Public Prosecutions has not been effective in prosecutorial action against them. Gender violence against women has increased exponentially over the past few years and something must be done to stop its escalation.
We need to adhere rigidly to the 1993 United Nations (UN) Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women. In October 2021, the
UN Special Rapporteur on protecting freedom of opinion and expression, Irene Khan, said: “women’s voices are suppressed, controlled, or punished explicitly by laws, policies and discriminatory practices, and implicitly by social attitudes, cultural norms and patriarchal values. Let us ponder on the prevalence of these practices, attitudes, norms and values within the structure of our governments throughout the decades since independence.
The tirade against Ghosh by Persaud occurred in August 2021 and it undoubtedly would have been brought to the attention of the Indian Government almost immediately and as international relations function, almost simultaneously conveyed to the Guyanese government. The government of India saying that Persaud had been cleared of any wrongdoing makes one wonder. This statement emanates from a country that has not shown signs of being able to reduce the pervasive misogyny and violence against women that exists there. His Excellency President Irfaan Ali stated that it was the first time he saw the video, which is the same for all of us, but I do not recall him saying that it was the first time he was hearing of the incident. Let the games end now and let our elected leaders stop playing with the characters and high standards that we as Guyanese would like to retain and disseminate. We are not too small to be respected. We have produced great ambassadors and statespersons such as Sir Shridath Ramphal, Sir John Carter, Rashleigh Jackson, Baroness Amos and Rudy Insanally, just to name a few. We have recently had ambassadorial departures from the United States and the United Kingdom, again just to name a few, who are still vibrant and whose characters are stellar. We depend on you, your Excellency, to be diligent in filling the vacancy left by Persaud with the appropriate person and to put profound research and astuteness into all of your future selections.
Sincerely,
Conrad Barrow
