Dear Editor,
There is much disgust over Mr Robert Corbin and calls for him to go. Stabroek News dedicated its Sunday editorial (December 14) to the state of the country and PNC under Mr Corbin’s leadership. The editorial reads like a little truth is good for the soul. In this vein let the conversations continue. SN, in its own words, admitted “an ethically divided society,” the PNC “has represented African Guyanese for half a century” and in the last elections “a substantial number of traditional PNC voters stayed home that day, but a significant number of those who did turn out put their X next to the AFC.” These are the factual truths being told, hence, the right of Africans to demand representation from the AFC and PNC.
For years, people, including scholars, have been talking about the impact and effect of race in our politics. Race is the elephant in the room the self-serving and their supporters want to ignore. People get upset, defensive and silence those who talk about African oppression and exclusion from the nation’s resources. No one wants you, borrowing from the Mighty Rebel, “to sing ’bout dat.” It takes Mr Corbin’s incompetence to speak truth to power. Mind you, this does not mean tomorrow Africans can talk about their marginalisation and get support for inclusion and equality. You will be told to “wait” or take an action dictated by outsiders. They don’t feel it, or know it, but will tell you what to do so you can be kept in your place.
The PNC, AFC and PPP leaderships congratulated Barack Obama on his victory and being the USA’s first Black President. Obama’s presidency is possible because Blacks fought Whites for equality and continue to zealously protect their rights. The PNC and AFC are too timid to fight the Indian dominated PPP for African equality and the PPP is excited over this African president once he’s not president of Guyana. I say this because otherwise the Sam Hinds musical chairs would never have happened and the PPP would have stopped trampling on our rights.
Both Robert Corbin and Raphael Trotman have disappointed the African constituents because they have egos that need the sustenance of others – those, who too often want to see the African constituents marginalised. Tell Mr Corbin and Mr Trotman the African is suffering and needs representation and that African equality and prosperity are linked to the country’s peace and prosperity, they’ll give 101 reasons why they can’t speak out or take action on our behalf.
SN thinks Mr Corbin “displays a curious psychological detachment from events.” Mr Trotman has this deficiency too. These men are lawyers and should lead the fight on rights and what it means when these rights are violated. Regrettably they continue to display no intellectual curiosity or tenacity for these very rights grounded in the laws. It takes Christopher Ram, a chartered accountant, in his KN and SN letter of December 14, to articulate the rights’ violations and dilemma facing the country.
Mr Corbin must go and so too must Mr Trotman. Trotman and Khemraj Ramjattan’s rise as the ‘new’ political leaders was encouraged by SN which allowed them to write columns, and which subsequently led to the formation of the AFC. SN may have a vested interest in seeing Mr Trotman in the AFC leadership. But it is Mr Ramjattan who watches out for the AFC Indian constituents while Trotman, Sheila Holder, Cathy Hughes and David Patterson are struggling or afraid to get their act together in the interest of the AFC African constituents.
People want to know what the Black man wants. The Black family wants their rights to be respected. We demand the constitutional right to equality and prosperity. Our rights are intricately linked to the rights of every race. When the Black man’s rights are trampled on they compromise the rights of everyone. Whoever takes over the PNC, the party that represented African Guyanese for half a century, they must never forget that!
Yours faithfully,
Osafo Modibo
