By Miranda La Rose
The book, “Dear Land of Guyana – My Quest for National Unity”, written by former prime minister Moses Nagamootoo is a reflection of his personal, political and social experiences in relation to forging national cohesiveness among Guyanese. These experiences may not be palatable for dinner discussions as they affect the dignity of Guyanese as a people, the author said.
Speaking at the launch of the book at the Pegasus Suites and Corporate Centre on Friday evening, Nagamootoo, also a former journalist, said, “We are together in this journey and dear land of Guyana is the dear land of all of us. It is not for a situation where 50 per cent must be in and 50 per cent must be out and those who are in today will be out tomorrow, or those who are out today will be in tomorrow or the next day.”
The book is his reflection of experiences he wants to share. “It is my truth, but it is a truth that comes out of profound experiences. The mistakes that were associated with those experiences would be a guideline for us, not to be guided simply by their successes but the learning that comes from experiencing those mistakes,” he said.
For instance, recalling when the 2020 general and regional elections were declared in August 2020, he said, “It appeared that the incoming regime could not wait to see our backs and gave us a rude ultimatum to vacate the premises.”
At about 10.00 pm, the day of the swearing in of President Irfaan Ally, he said, “we were disturbed by noises in the yard of the [PM’s official] residence. I peered out and saw lights flashing, then vehicles driving out.”
The next morning, he found that the security personnel with vehicles assigned to his office were removed. He was advised to return the prime minister’s official vehicle to the Office of the President by the end of the day.
He said it was an inexplicable display of incivility and recklessness where the former prime minister was stripped of personal security protection and all state transportation facilities. He and his wife were literally told to “walk home.”
He said that when people arrive at a situation in a country where the rules, respect for national symbols, respect for leaders and elders are not observed, people lose their values, self-respect and they degrade the society.
“That is why we must always return to this requirement of institutionalised unity. The division is not only negative. The division in our society is debilitating. It is eating us away and taking what is left of us,” he said.
Some of his experiences in government and in opposition, he noted, were painful to document. Dear Land of Guyana is not a walk in the park. It is not a work of joy for me. It is what I felt was necessary to be told. What I have said might be hurtful to some people, it is not my intention,” he said.
The self-published, 344-page book that contains 25 chapters, starts with Nagamootoo’s return to his home in North Sophia and looks at the time he spent in office as prime minister between 2015 to 2020. The chapters address the recount of the ballots of the 2020 general elections, then subsequently what he deems foreign interference. He traces the compact of the Alliance for Change’s with A Platform for National Unity as a pro-democracy alliance and the Cummingsburg Accord.
Among the many interesting chapters are Dr Cheddi Jagan’s legacy, ‘Sugar’s sour story’, ‘Regime change and betrayal’.
While some members of the public were asking where the former prime minister had disappeared to, Nagamootoo said, over the past three years he was in and out of his children’s sitting rooms and kitchens, writing, day in and day out.
“More importantly, they took me around to various places in the United States that I had wanted to visit,” he said, to retrace his own radical roots in the Black Power and Civil Rights movements. It was an experience to visit the place where Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated, he said. It allowed him to reflect on his participation in the revolutionary movements in the Caribbean, initially through the Black Power Movement in the 1970s, when he moved around with Kwame Ture (formerly Stokely Carmichael) and former prime minister of Dominica Rosie Douglas. At the time they felt their mission was to change the thinking of the world to one of inclusiveness.
At the launch were copies of Nagamooto’s five other publications showing him up as a prolific writer. “Radical Roots: Selected Essays on West Indian Politics”, chronicles his political groundings; “Like Scattered Seeds: And Other Short Stories from the Diaspora”, is about Guyanese making their mark in an adopted homeland; “Fragments From Memory: A True Story of Love and Sacrifice”, is an autobiography and “Hendree’s Cure” speaks of the richness of the Madrassi culture in a traditional countryside Guyana.
Of his short stories, Nagamootoo said, “You don’t have to be serious all the time. You have to just write when the thoughts come to you and you want to share that experience with people to enrich their lives.”
Also noteworthy was his collection of poems, “Paintings in Poetry”. Nagamootoo does not claim to be a poet. His poems came out of his emotions and connectivity with nature, people and concerns for humanity and the planet earth. He started writing poems as a young boy.
“I recall in 1966 writing in the Berbice Times a poem that had the distinct feature of Dave Martins’, ‘Not a Blade of Grass’. Being the son of a fisherman, I see my protest over Venezuela’s coming out in, ‘Not one cuirass,’” he said.
Concern for nationhood is not just an overnight thing, he said. “They are feelings that are nurtured by circumstances. Like Venezuela’s aggression or when we experienced the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said.
“One can write about these experiences in different forms of literary expression. That was why I decided to throw everything into writing because I have the time, the energy and more importantly the memory.”
While he wrote for the Mirror newspaper, the then editor-in-chief Mrs Janet Jagan described Nagamootoo as the party’s pet poet. In 1975 he won a People’s Progressive Party poetry competition with the poem, ‘Reminiscences’.
He thanked his wife Sita, who encourages him to write and who, he said, “has this fantastic patience to know I am locked away in a safe place and perhaps have to schedule meetings with her. It didn’t bother her once she knew where I was and what I was doing.”
