Dear Editor,
During the Sunday, March 17, 2019 edition of the Walter Rodney Groundings (WRG) television programme the nation was informed by the moderator, Kidackie Amsterdam, that well known public personality Mr. Christopher Ram had sent a lawyer‘s letter to Mr. Desmond Trotman, demanding that Trotman satisfy a number of demands made by Ram, that included a public apology and the payment of a substantial sum in damages for what Ram considered as statements of a defamatory nature made against him on a previous edition of the programme. Trotman was warned that his failure to meet Ram’s demands would result in legal action against him for defamation of Ram’s character.
I had the good fortune of knowing and working politically with both gentlemen closely for a number of years. I make this point to say that I am in a good position to judge politically the intent of statements made by either party in relation to their public utterances. Both men in their own way have earned for themselves a formidable public reputation, which each will feel the need to defend when their utterances and actions are questioned in the public space. This is their individual natural responses when either of them perceived they are under attack.
I saw the programme that generated this controversy and heard what Trotman had said in relation to Chris Ram’s public advocacy, particularly his almost daily criticism of the APNU+AFC government, which Trotman said he believed Ram is entitled to do and he juxtaposed that against Ram’s failure to publicly defend himself against accusations contained in a letter, which I have seen, that was authored by Mr Rustum Bulkan, a senior partner in the firm of Precision Woodworking Ltd.
I am also aware that these accusations had surfaced sometime in 2016 and in that sense, were not new. As a friend of Ram, when I first heard of the accusations, I eagerly looked forward to his spirited public defence on this matter. To date, I know of no such defence. All this time I was certain that Ram, the ultra-vigilant lawyer, social activist, anti-corporation fighter and political aspirant, had knowledge of this “red flag” hanging over his head. I was curious why he would have chosen to be silent on such a matter.
Frankly, Trotman in calling out Christopher Ram to defend himself against this accusation is inviting him to clear his name, in my humble opinion this is/was an action more in Ram’s interest. This matter is one which Ram, seemingly, thought it would have been more beneficial to him not to offer a comprehensive and an unambiguous response since it was first raised. Trotman‘s challenge now gives him the opportunity to do just that. He, however, chooses the “dishonourable” option of threatening legal action by invoking the elites’ social/political culture of threatening a lawsuit against a working-class comrade who is engaged in responsible public polemics. Ram ought to know by now that no act of bullyism or threats will faze Trotman in exposing wrongdoing on the part of anyone, including Ram if he believes that is taking place or may have occurred. One would have expected that Ram’s legal venom would be directed to the Bulkans who are better placed to respond to his threats and to compensate him if the matter is determined and lost by them in a court of law.
In closing my advice to Mr Christopher Ram is he has nothing to gain from his present line of action. On the balance of probability, he has more to lose. I am no lawyer, speaking as a layperson it is my considered opinion that a court of law would not uphold a libel suit based on the remarks I heard Desmond Trotman make on the Walter Rodney Groundings programme.
Yours faithfully,
Tacuma Ogunseye
