Dear Editor,
Hamilton Green’s preposterous revisionist pontificating on Burnham cannot get a free pass (“Burnham was a visionary and ahead of his time”, SN Feb 19, 2023). Annette Ferguson definitely needs to ease up on the copious amounts of Burnham Kool Aid (‘Truth of Burnham’s visionary leadership must be told’, SN, Feb 26, 2023). Burnham revisionism cannot pass. It is utterly dangerous in these perilous times of rising ethnic tensions driven by the lure of oil wealth and by political inciters. Burnhamism – that practice of destructive egotistical and megalomaniacal politics – continues to damn Guyana. It is coming from both sides. Jagdeo is the closest political reincarnation of Burnham we’ve had, without the intellectual depth and charisma, of course. However, the Machiavellian cunning is just the same. The PNC is as Burnhamite in approach and thinking as it has ever been, particularly since the crude election rigging debauchery.
The Machiavellian cunning is less compared to Jagdeo but it is strong nevertheless. The deeply turbulent political gyrations of the last four years brimming with brinkmanship, backstabbing no-confidence votes, one-upmanship, betrayals, constitutional crises, delaying constitutional desecration, absurd mathematical mayhem, depraved distortion politics, crude and ludicrous attempted electoral rigging, rule of law degeneracy and overall constitutional sacrilege are profane reminders of Burnhamism at its best. A no-confidence vote brimming with betrayal to bring down a government was classic Burnham power-at-all-costs politics. The ensuing ridiculous delaying tactics to hold onto power as well as the comical rigging attempts in the aftermath of the election were again classic Burnhamism. All driven by that obsession to obtain ultimate power with no contemplation of, and full disregard to consequences, and with no regard to logic and doing the right thing. The Burnhamite-Jagdeoites almost lost the very power they tried to gain with the no-confidence vote.
The Burnhamite-Jagdeoites took an atrocious gamble and would have most likely lost an election called right away by a coalition not infected with Burnhamism. If the PNC-dominated coalition had called an election right away it most likely would have won the election fairly and freely. It had the power of the government coffers and vastly more campaign money to spend massively and quickly, the advantage of a quick shock election call to catch the PPP by surprise, a massive anti-PPP sentiment among previously apolitical Mixed and Amerindian voters, driven by perceived betrayal by Charrandass Persaud in the no-confidence vote, a solid relationship with the Western geopolitical powers, grave public mistrust of Jagdeo as a leader at that time, even greater disapproval of the Jagdeoite puppet in Irfaan Ali at the time, and a GECOM machinery under its will. Finally, by calling an election right away, the PNC would have severely dented its perception as a political entity aligned with electoral wrongdoing and illegality. It would have been cathartic. That change in perception alone would have generated enough apathy in the Indian vote disgusted with the Jagdeoites and driven some independent votes its way to most likely guide it to victory.
Instead, we got decisions made out of pure power lust, retribution and reckless ambition, outrageous megalomania and self-preservation, those illustrious Burn-hamite qualities. Decisions that were shockingly propelled by a failed mindset that left the PNC on the outside looking in just as the oil wealth started rolling in while the PPP has lost massive trust from an already ambivalent Mixed and Amerindian ethnic groups and is unsure of its future political fortunes. Even if we look past Burnham’s mess in the destruction of the wider Guyanese economy, how could African-Guyanese celebrate this man when his brand of politics absolutely debased African-Guyanese economically? When Guyana gained Independence, Africans were economically ahead of the other major ethnic groups (Indians, Mixed and Amerindians). The high African participation rate in the well paid civil service played a key role in that reality and that participation increased significantly once Independence came and the Whites, Portuguese and Indians fled or were purged from that well-paid civil service.
Africans had solid engagement in commercial, capitalistic and entrepreneurial activities in the early sixties. The country was economically strong with Guyana having the 50th highest GDP per capita in the world at Independence. For 26 years from 1966-1992, Burnham and his vessel, the PNC, held unbridled, absolute and omnipotent power. He could do anything he wanted to dramatically shape the African-Guyanese economic condition for the better. Anything! What did he and the PNC do? Nothing. Nada. Actually, strike that. They did something that dramatically shaped the African-Guyanese economic condition that was superior to other main ethnic groups in 1966. They annihilated it. I cannot find any ethnic group in history, without revolutionary upheaval, that held this kind of untrammeled power and yet ended up so economically devastated when it lost power. An African Guyanese maximum leader with unrestrained power. The 50th highest GDP per capita in the world at Independence. The full backing of the West and its endless capital, desperate to counter Jagan’s communist fascinations. Concrete examples of what this capital could do with Singapore and some other countries as fitting examples.
The screaming knowledge that African-Guyanese were a numerical minority group in an ethnically divided country. The loud truth that African-Guyanese economic superiority was tenuous without stronger capitalistic activity on its part given the growing capitalistic participation of Indians and Mixed. The potent knowledge that no other system, absolutely none, can give economic surety and dominance like capitalism to a numerical and economic minority group, particularly when that group happens to hold absolute power. Yet for all these truths that were as clear as day to anyone with a single brain cell, Forbes Burnham completely ignored them and ended up making decisions that consummately eviscerated African-Guyanese economically. The PNC went socialist and even communist at times (see nationalization for reference). Socialism destroyed the last remnants of serious African-Guyanese capitalism, commercialism and entrepreneurship. It pushed and pulled African-Guyanese from capitalist, commercial and entrepreneurial endeavours to government jobs driven by party card politics.
To add insult to injury, when the PNC banned foreign products, the country became even more reliant on the local farming community, which was by then mostly devoid of African-Guyanese farmers thanks to the outrageous idiocy of Forbes Burnham and his lackeys. This strengthened Indian capitalism. Indians also deployed valuable capital into contraband, gaining wealth off of the failed PNC policies. When the PNC policies led to a massive exodus of Guyanese, mostly of non-African ethnic groups early on, these groups quickly gained massive capital overseas, particularly in the US. When that capital was reinvested in Guyana, Africans, already economically demolished by Burnham and his mimic men, were incapable of competing. When the US told the PNC to pack its bags and leave, what did it do despite having the power to do anything it wanted? It failed to enshrine any kind of constitutional economic protection for its constituency despite having a supermajority to make any law it wanted and despite knowing that African-Guyanese were fiscally battered by the PNC’s own policies.
The PNC then sold state enterprises at dirt prices to mostly non-African businesses. It failed to implement any protective laws for its own kith and kin knowing there was an economic bloodbath coming. Guyana became a market economy under the PNC and African-Guyanese were ruthlessly exposed by the same PNC that economically castrated them. African-Guyanese entered the sixties economically ahead of Indian-Guyanese and started the 1990s economically behind thanks largely to the failed policies of Burnhamism. Here’s another truth that is probably the most disgusting of them all: this socialist state created by Burnham was nothing more than Burnham’s quest to satisfy all his desires. One man subjugated an entire country and more critically, his own ethnic group to economic vicissitudes that are downright criminal simply to fulfill his depraved hunger for total power.
A socialist state was the best vehicle for Burnham’s brand of totalitarianism and total control, the economic condition of Guyanese and African-Guyanese be damned! Imagine this clown killed Walter Rodney! This Burnhamite burning hunger for power at all costs and without regard to consequence has had its knee on Guyana’s neck since we developed proper political consciousness. Add the lesser but still potent totalitarian antics of Jaganism and Guyana has been having a helluva ride. Power without consequence is horrible enough. With the Burnhamites, we get superior incompetence with it. I’m no man of God but Guyana will need divine intervention. It’s a bloody shame because it is about to squander that oil wealth while swimming in a sea of suffocating despotism and raging megalomania, thanks primarily to Burnham and those desperately trying to outdo him and his legacy.
Sincerely,
M. Maxwell
