Dear Editor,
On a recent flight from Japan to the United States, I stumbled on a quote by Eric Arthur Blair, a British Indian essayist, novelist, journalist and critic, who under the penmanship of “George Orwell” said, “In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” In response to the fairytale and dishonesty postulated by the professor, I will deconstruct his folly that there is no racial dilemma and that political parties in Guyana have been able to build prosperous political institutions based on “competent supporters.” His intention of this factionary missive is nothing short of sheer hypocrisy and misleading filled with unwavering deceit of which I find my obligation of spearheading the dissemination of the truth, something the naïve professor don’t have the ability to do.
The assertion that political parties are supposed to be “key institutions in competitive democratic political systems” cannot be debated but in Guyana there has not been a single political party in the last 60 years that has built effective social, political and economic organizations for its members. Rather, parties have been a friend and family institution of “jobs and contracts for the boys” as well as massive giveaways to multinational corporations at the behest of poverty and marginalization of its citizens. This is what the professor has not been able to explain. If the misinformed professor is not sure of yours truly knowledge of politics, then he should consult with the academic department of my university for an extensive listing of coursework I have completed in international relations and politics.
But, using the United States of America as the model for a distinction between state and government, is miscalculated. Though there is minute changes to the state (civil servants) the Trump and Obama administrations drew stark contrasts. In Guyana, the state is incapable of growing effective institutions and investing in human development, but governments are the driving force for the direction of the country, so his insipid points on whose fueling racial ills much less fixing them is unsubstantiated. For instance, the state by way of the law should have prosecuted the grooming, coercion and alleged raping of an Indigenous teenager by the Former Minister of Local Government and Regional Development. Similarly, state entities such as Guyana Power and Light cannot afford tomfoolery excuses for repeated blackouts, mismanagement and financial impropriety as a norm that the government cannot accept responsibility for this failing state institution.
So, it’s moronic for the professor, who’s an Adviser to the President to make such false claim which tells of the type of advice he is giving to the President. His ill-conceived ideas are based strictly on financial returns or whatever he can collect from the government at the expense of the taxpayers. The callous professor needs to stop being complaisant and being in denial of the truth and seek to refresh his out of touch knowledge base and references. While at it, this disorderly fellow should seek to improve his writing style that is akin to the elementary level. Providing small sample size of convenient names of experts whom the government turn to for last resort expert opinions to which it cannot glean from anywhere else is not the ideal of utilizing expertise. There are many more experts in Guyana and in the diaspora that are knowledgeable in politics, economics, health, agriculture, education and housing sectors just to name a few, that is not being utilized.
And this has been the problem with governments who has and continues to practice partisan politics in Guyana for the last six decades. This is why youths who are 66 percent of the population have to come to the fore and change the partisan politics for the betterment of Guyana. In conclusion, the adviser makes an accurate point that “the government must make good on educating the populace on politics and keys to institutions.” Then immediately, pivots to a grandstanding of his political party’s superpower in preventing the dilemma of Thomas Hobbes “life of nasty, brutish and short.” Civil servants don’t spearhead policies in parliament, control political agendas like death squads, laundering of money through vain projects, target political opponents, marginalization of a section of the population for expressing truths (such as yours truly response in this article).
Fostering a leadership model of corruption and sleaziness are all components of Hobbes Leviathan state of which the government he claims to advise have been an active participant. It is without a doubt, all these truths are easily verifiable by the common man pointing to a deeper racial divide that exist in the country and is troubling and appalling to think someone who claims to be a professor cannot differentiate between this regime and the ideals of justice which Platonic, Aristotelian and Thucydidian philosophies advocate.
Sincerely,
Collin Haynes MPH MBA
