Editorial

It should concern all of the people of Guyana, not only Region 10, that a multi-faceted agreement to address the origins of the unrest on July 18, 2012 that claimed three lives and sparked mayhem in Linden is yet to produce a single tangible result.

Dreadful things happen in this society, but nothing quite appalled the nation as much as the allegations which were publicized last week concerning Colwyn Harding, who is currently in the Georgetown Public Hospital under treatment. 

Earlier this week the government of Mexico sent thousands of federal police and military troops into the western state of Michoacán, hoping to arrest suspected members of the Knights Templar drug cartel.

Alleged arson attacks on the Venezuelan Embassy and the Organisation of American States (OAS) office in St Kitts and Nevis, two Sundays ago, served to place the spotlight on the health of that country’s democracy.

Almost 100 years ago, an army convoy travelled from the White House to Lincoln Park in San Francisco, a distance of nearly 2500 miles.

In the course of 2013 there was periodic grumbling within the region as to whether our integration movement had been making progress towards increasing unification of effort in both the economic and political spheres.

The fact that it took this length of time to cause the physical conditions in the vicinity of the National Assembly to secure some measure of public attention is a poignant comment on the way we live as a country.

On January 3rd this year, the Minister of Home Affairs, Mr Clement Rohee delivered a progress report on a series of new plans he had unveiled on the last day of 2012 to rein in crime.

The citizens of this country should be very grateful to the Touchau, Councillors and residents of the small Amerindian village of Karaudarnau in the Rupununi, because they were the ones who stopped the Parabara road, being built by a Brazilian, from being driven through their lands.

The day before yesterday, in a marathon press conference, Chris Christie, the Governor of New Jersey, engaged in a spectacular act of contrition.

Eusébio – like all the truly great sportsmen of history, Eusébio da Silva Ferreira was instantly recognisable by his first name alone.

“I go to the market every Sunday; I know what it takes for a family of four or five to put food on the table, to put shelter and so forth.

It would probably not be an overstatement to say that the year just passed was dominated by events in the Middle East.

What politicians do, the decisions they make and the pronouncements which they place in the public domain have to do first and foremost with what they perceive to be best for their political fortunes.

The announcement on Saturday by Muri Brasil Ventures Inc (MBVI) that it would no longer pursue its controversial Permission for Geographical and Geophysical Survey (PGGS) in the New River Triangle in southeastern Guyana has to be seen as a positive result for society’s struggle for openness and accountability in governance.

President Ramotar has now completed two years in office with a complement of ministers largely inherited from his predecessor. 

Four days ago the temperature in Winnipeg fell to -31°C (with a mind-numbing -48°C wind chill), the city’s coldest day in 80 years and colder than surface temperatures at the North Pole and on Mars, according to the Manitoba Museum. 

At the dawn of the New Year, most of us will have come through the past couple of weeks of religious observance, companionship and revelry, with great hopes for ourselves, our families and even our troubled country.

The year has come to an end in the Caricom part of the wider region with the IMF giving approval to Jamaica’s efforts at implementation of its Extended Fund Arrangement which had been laboriously finalized over a prolonged period that saw the electoral defeat of the Jamaica Labour Party Government led by Andrew Holness, and the assumption of office by the People’s National Party led by Portia Simpson, subsequently elected in December of 2011.

Once you understand the ebb and flow in the fortunes of Guyana’s public servants in their unending quest for better wages and, by extension, a higher standard of living, the paucity of the turnout for the December 20 protest march would have been entirely unsurprising.