I have been involved in Guyanese politics since the age of 16. I have abided by the principle, so perfectly articulated by the great African freedom fighter, Amilcar Cabral. Cabral, who instructed us to: “Hide nothing from the masses of our people. Tell no lies. Expose lies whenever they are told. Mask no difficulties, mistakes, failures. Claim no easy victories.”
By now, surely all Guyanese must have realised that the last five years of APNU+AFC governance, and their bizarre and embarrassing behaviour following the March 2020 elections, has changed Guyana’s political landscape. I hope and pray that Guyanese of all races, will wake up and see that the major contradiction is between the exploiters and the exploited, the oppressors and the oppressed, the “haves” and “have-nots”. For OVP, it is about Guyanese of every race, who toil 40-60 hours weekly, and still cannot adequately care for their families. They are the working poor, who wait longingly for every pay-day, knowing that before the next pay-day, they and their children will be back to tennis roll and tea. It is about those who hustle every day to eke out a living in dilapidated markets and on the pavement. It is about those who are forced to beg for a living, including many of our elders. This is a terrible injustice, in a country that is so resource-rich, and with fewer than a million people.
There were many people who believed that the APNU+AFC government was the answer to their prayers. When they first came to power in 2015, their supporters were crying out, “thank you Jesus” and “David and Moses will deliver us”. It has been a painful process watching the debacle of the last five years, culminating in the tragic events that followed the March 2020 elections, which even led to the loss of lives. If anything positive can come out of it, it will be that Guyanese of all races will finally realise that we must judge a government not on their race, but on their policies and actions.
Organization for the Victory of the People (OVP) congratulates President Ali on his decision to kick out the two principals of the rogue foreign company, Superior Concrete. For too long, foreign capital and their local minions have been running riot in this country.OVP urges President Ali and his government to reign in the local business people who facilitated this rogue company. We advocate that this approach be consistently applied across the board, to all corporate predators and plunderers, including ExxonMobil. Guyana has a class of business people that constitute a socio-economic category known as the “comprador bourgeoisie”. According to Serbian radical sociologist, Ljubisa Mitrovic, “this upper layer of the bourgeois class, posits its own interests over the general social ones…it is not national in character and is socially irresponsible. It is a blind servant of foreign capital, ruthless in the exploitation of the domestic workforce and dictatorial in relation to its fellow countrymen”. Those with eyes to see can identify these people in our midst. They constitute the 1% that own and control the wealth of this nation.
In addition, we must congratulate President Ali and his government on the issuing of 20,000 scholarships. This is an excellent move, because Guyanese of all races are in dire need of education and upgrading if they are to take their rightful place in the future development of our nation. The scholarships on offer are not “PPP scholarships”, they are scholarships issued by the Government of Guyana, I urge all African Guyanese, once they fulfill the necessary criteria, to apply immediately and take advantage of this opportunity. As I write, news has been posted that the Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand, is talking about abolishing the draconian National Grade 6 exam and making every school a “good school”. This is something that OVP has called for since our inception (see The National Grade 6 Assessment is a class based system, KN, 4/7/17).zI say to all Guyanese that we need to move beyond race-based politics, recognise that the fundamental contradiction in our society is between the “have and the have-nots”, regardless of their ethnicity, and begin to exercise our right to decide who will govern this nation on the basis of their policies and actions.
Gerald A. Perreira
Organisation for the Victory of the People (OVP)