Addressing an audience at a recent Private Sector Commission event, President Irfaan Ali was reported as saying that the unity of the nation and the surge of patriotism this year reflected a conscious effort by government to address not only external challenges, but also to instil a strong sense of national values. “It is the same spirit that moves us and [that] our country needs most; [it] is this same spirit that is required continuously every day, every second, to move us together as One Guyana,” he was quoted as saying. Continuing in the same vein he said, “It cannot be the pain of the moment that drives us together,” rather it was that pain which “teaches us that we have the ability to come together …”
The fact that Guyanese displayed unity on the issue of Venezuela’s ludicrous purported ‘annexation’ of Essequibo is hardly indicative of unity at any other level; patriotism is not to be confused with a common vision on every issue. Neither was the rejection of Venezuelan greed by all the citizens of this land a consequence of the government instilling “a strong sense of national values.” It was rather the automatic gut reaction of all Guyanese no matter their politics, race, class or age to the intended expropriation by our next-door-neighbour of territory which has been part of our patrimony since the seventeenth century. That is a feeling which does not have to be instilled; it lies dormant within all of us until roused by some threat, and forms the foundation of what it means to be Guyanese.
The President’s declared initiatives aimed at instilling a strong sense of national values in Guyanese youth included promoting civic education, supporting cultural events and celebrating national heroes and historical milestones. Leaving aside civic education, which has always been an element in the Social Studies paper of the Secondary Schools Entrance Examination, all governments in this country have supported cultural events as well as celebrated national heroes and historical milestones.
What the head of state did not mention was the teaching of history per se, not just in schools or at the university level where it seems to have declined in significance, but where Essequibo is concerned especially, in the form of popular radio and television programmes and articles on social media. While no doubt the President can give a tolerable account of events relating to the boundary since 1899, does he know anything about the history of the county before that date? What does he say to President Nicolás Maduro when he meets him, and the latter rabbits on about Essequibo being part of Venezuela as reflected in the establishment of the Captaincy General in 1777? And that thereafter the British stole it in 1814? It is all codswallop, of course, but codswallop if repeated often enough without challenge will be believed by outsiders.
Where officialdom is concerned, as said before they can begin by reading Cedric Joseph’s introduction to the issue beginning in the seventeenth century, which was written in 1970 and 1971, and then move on from there. It is too difficult to be used in schools, but its information could be extracted for the purpose and combined with other works.
What the President seems to resist is the idea that unity is not achievable in terms of all the policies and projects undertaken by government, no matter how patriotic the population appears to be. He has never been clear, of course, about what he means by unity or ‘One Guyana’, let alone how that is to be implemented. He seems to be confusing unity and uniformity, since his vision, in so far as it has been explicated, reflects the latter rather than the former. In any healthy democracy it will be impossible to get everyone to agree on everything, even when crucial licences and projects are involved. This doesn’t mean critics are unpatriotic, quite the contrary in fact. It is just that they see the choices as these relate to the development of the nation in a different light. And as for uniformity, that is for autocracies, not democracies.
The unity of a people does not require them to have the same approach to ExxonMobil, or gold mining or the Indigenous people or any number of economic and social projects. The fact that the government is trying to develop the nation does not mean that critics do not want development too, although they may have very different notions of what that entails. And then there are the conflicts inherent in some policies and ventures which have to be reconciled or where one side or the other has to be favoured. The Indigenous people and mining come automatically to mind, as do environmental considerations and all kinds of economic investments, large and small. Acceptance of every governmental decision in every sphere by everyone in the nation is hardly a realistic expectation on the President’s part, and is not even desirable. A country with such varied interests needs space for sensible public debate involving actors with whom the government might not be comfortable, and that space should be protected and not bypassed, as has been the case with Parliament and local government bodies in recent times.
Where unity is required is not on specific economic, social and political policies, but on the structure of the state and its institutions, and the need for whoever is in office to respect these. As such, the drafting of amendments to our constitution, which it is hoped will begin next year will probably represent the most significant development in terms of local politics.
But whatever disagreements and lack of ‘unity’ there might be in relation to policies and the like in the coming months, the President can relax; the patriotism of citizens will remain unchanged. He doesn’t have to do anything on that front.