Dear Editor,
In 1992 when PPP ministers and regional chairmen assumed office, they told the people of Region Two, that they could meet them any time, any place and anywhere; they could even meet them at their house, wake them up, and they would address their problems. At first we could have meet them at their office, but not anywhere or any time as they had promised. From my experience as deputy mayor, when you went to meet them, they would hide from you in their office, and would tell their secretary to tell the people who had travelled miles with their grievance that they were not in the office.
After a time they used their positions to do wrong things; they even interfered with justice by trying to influence the police and the judiciary from doing their work independently. These officials became lawless and the electorate lost confidence in them, so they decided to vote for a change in 2015. On May 13, 2008, I had my first experience when known thugs tried to burn down my house twice after I stood up against bullyism. These incidents happened around midnight; the police were summoned and they arrived on the scene promptly. They found shards of broken bottles and wicks soaked with gasoline on my front verandah. One area had been scorched by the molotov cocktail.
They found evidence of who the perpetrators were, and the men were placed in the lock-up. Afterwards a senior officer received a phone call from higher political authority to release the perpetrators. My wife and I decided to go to the Anna Regina police station to see what action had been taken against these two men, and discovered that the men had been freed and were socializing with a political official at a Chinese beer garden not far from the police station. This man and I had worked closely with the PPP party for the restoration of democracy in 1992. Having seen this I decided to call the general secretary of the party and tell him what I saw and that I needed protection. He gave me a minister’s home telephone number and told me to call him, informing him that I had spoken to him and he had given me his number. I called the minister the said night and told him what transpired.
He told me that he was going to Berbice the next day and I should call him back the next night when he returned. I did call him, and as he picked up his phone he blared out with ignorance shouting at me not to call his telephone again. I was amazed at his attitude as a minister of the government. These were men who knew me personally and used to visit my home often to hold party group meetings, and update them on the current political situation in the county. After gaining power in 1992, they became power- drunk and forgot the people who voted them into office. Their new friends and comrades became the rich and powerful who never wanted to see the PPP when it was out of office for 28 years. I approached many of these same comrades to become members of the party, but they refused, saying that they wanted nothing to do with the PPP. At the Cotton Field Congress, I saw these same men who refused to be members attending the congress and were given a hearty welcome with packages.
Some of these people suddenly became fly-by-night contractors; they jumped on the bandwagon after 1992 being given large contracts with thousands acres of state lands. Others were given privileges, and when these ministers came into the region, they could be seen at these contractors’ houses, drinking and having a nice time. They had no time to resuscitate the party groups which were not functioning for decades. The Mirror newspapers sales fell from 3000 to a very small number, and only at election time was party work being done.
I am sharing this information, so our new government ministers will not make these mistakes, where the people will lose confidence in them, then vote them out of office after 5 years. We must be a disciplined government for all the people and no one must left behind,whether they voted for the coalition or not. I implore that our ministers act on problems which are featured in the letters column of the press; this information is sometimes real and makes sense.
Yours faithfully,
Mohamed Khan
