News reports in the State media show that senior Government officials persist in branding independent thinkers in this country as agents of the “opposition”.
It’s like if Government leaders harbour a deep hatred for people in this country who exercise independent thinking and critical analysis of our society.
Reports on NCN TV and in the State-owned newspaper this week both quoted Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee’s unhappiness with independent analysis of Government’s performance.
Rohee seems to think that any media outlet that refuses to lavish blind praise on Government leaders is “opposition”.
Such a view is downright dangerous.
We also heard a Public Relations employee from the Office of the President go on State TV to brand independent columnists and journalists as “opposing” the Government.
Such utterances show up a frightening mentality within the Government, made worse with the State media ban of calypsos critical of the Administration.
This is an alarming Government expectation – that we should all bow to Party group-think and become pawns of the ruling party with its collective ideology. Citizens of this nation cannot tolerate any Government silencing their voices.
Quite shocking it is that as a Caribbean nation, in a country rubbing shoulders with South America, where democracy, free speech and openness now reign supreme, we harbour a society where our elected Government hates critical thinking.
We must nip such intolerance before it takes deep root.
We must zealously guard our right to free speech, to the freedom of choice to be critical of Government, and to the exercise of one’s independence of mind.
Our society must generate an outcry against such utterances from State leaders. They cannot be allowed to go around branding and labelling anyone or any professional media operation as “opposition”.
What kind of society would we build if we all thought alike, if we all rallied around an omnipotent Government that sees itself as the God of the land, as knowing everything and needing no advice or citizen input?
Banking on its ethnic support on elections day, this Government may very well be tolerating free and fair elections because it wins national polls. Were it to start losing, it may become disgruntled with our democracy. That’s the danger of allowing Government leaders to brand citizens, who express independent thought and opinion, as opposing the country.
It is sad and a great pity that the ruling People’s Progressive Party has, over the past two decades, completely squandered its goodwill with this nation.
When the Government took office in 1992, its critics were few. The entire nation rooted for Dr Cheddi Jagan and his vision for a new dawn. In fact, Guyanese all over the world rooted for our nation.
Today, the ministers of Government seem bent on betraying that goodwill.
These were men who stood in the trenches and fought for free and fair elections.
Sam Hinds, N K Gopaul and others in GUARD and the trade union movement; Kellawan Lall and Robert Persaud as reporters for the Mirror newspaper; Leslie Ramsammy and Manzoor Nadir as leaders of small political parties dedicated to a decent Guyana: they all exhibited exquisite characters.
Today, these leaders no longer command that kind of respect, goodwill and trust from decent-minded citizens.
Men like Raphael Trotman, Khemraj Ramjattan, Moses Nagamootoo, Richard Van West Charles, Anand Goolsarran, Christopher Ram, David Granger, Ralph Ramkarran, Gerhard Ramsaroop and a few others, thankfully, maintain their character and ethical leadership standard, caring for the welfare of the country more than personal ambition.
And how does the Government react to such stalwarts of our nation?
They brand them as “opposition”, instead of reaching across divides to heal this nation of its 40-odd years of social malaise, gross poverty, and paucity of leadership.
When no one within Government, or the ruling party, stands up to question the State about its practices – about the Chinese labour fiasco, about pervasive corruption, about organized crime, about our rate of illiteracy, about wasted State funds – then one can only wonder at the lack of critical thinking allowed within our leadership establishment.
Such a scenario is frightening, alarming and dangerous, for it fosters a society that refuses to see the need for improvement, where the leaders think of themselves as omnipotent, possessing all the answers.
Such supposed wisdom results in absolute foolishness. To suppose that only officials know what’s right and good, and everyone else is wrong, could only be foolishness. And we suffer as a people from this foolish way of being.
When we cannot keep our capital city clean; when we cannot carry on a decent conversation in Parliament; when thousands of kids leave school unable to read literature; when our Government screams “opposition!” every time someone from outside its ranks suggests a new idea or thought, or questions an official policy or project, then we have become a foolish nation.
We cannot tolerate our Home Affairs Minister maligning the integrity of our professional media. We cannot tolerate such foolishness as a communications officer of the Office of the President maligning Journalists as agents of the opposition. Taxpayers must demand ethical behaviour from public servants, especially leaders.
All of this nation’s independent thinkers, institutions, organizations and even our Parliamentarians, on both sides, should express their utmost disappointment with such public statements from Government Ministers and Government leaders.
We ought to establish a protocol of Parliamentary sanction against such utterances.
We cannot allow our leaders to run around maligning independent thinkers and professional critics and independent auditors like Dr Anand Goolsarran.
