Hmmm...bomb scare...who has the greater incentive to do that?

UN Report Status of Minorities in Guyana by Gay McDougall


Note: This Report has been accepted as evidence in the present libel case – Jagdeo vs Kissoon, regarding a column written by Kissoon last year. You can read the court reports on this website.

UN Report Status of Minorities in Guyana by Gay McDougall

Here is the link to the complete Report http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/pdfid/49bfa6ec2.pdf:


Summary –

The independent expert on minority issues, Ms. Gay McDougall, visited Guyana between 28 July and 1 August 2008. During her visit, she travelled to Georgetown and surrounding communities. She held consultations with the State President, ministers and other senior government representatives, NGOs, civil society groups, political parties, religious leaders, academics and others working in the field of minority issues and anti-discrimination.

The independent expert visited communities, including Buxton, and talked to community members about their lives and issues. =

In July 2003, the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance highlighted that he found that every level of Guyanese society is permeated by a profound moral, emotional and political fatigue, arising out of the individual and collective impact of ethnic polarization.1 In 2008, the independent expert witnessed a continuing societal malaise that shows evidence of having deepened and transformed in some instances into despair, anger and resistance. This is particularly evident among Afro-Guyanese individuals and communities that reported feeling excluded, discriminated against and criminalized.

Ethnically divided political and administrative structures and failed political processes have created deep frustrations and distrust in the institution of government. A climate of suspicion, rumour and conspiracy theory exists in Guyana which has been fuelled by exceptionally violent incidents in 2008. Two separate and conflicting narratives and perceptions of reality have emerged among Afro- and Indo-Guyanese, which threaten to undermine shared values and common goals that are essential to a united, prosperous Guyana.

The independent expert recognizes commendable steps on the part of the Government to date to address issues of ethnic tensions, criminal activities and economic underdevelopment.

However, further effective action is required urgently to restore confidence in good governance and the rule of law among all communities, and prevent an inexorable slide into further polarization and possible violence. A new era of political will and strong, visionary leadership is required to realize change and reverse the economic and social stagnation that is evident in a divided Guyana.

Afro-Guyanese with whom the independent expert met described feeling excluded from having a full voice and stake in the national polity and equal enjoyment of rights in many fields of life including employment and economic participation. They reported stigmatization of young Afro-Guyanese males and entire African communities. Derogatory stereotypes of criminality colour wider societal perceptions of Afro-Guyanese individuals and communities.

Particular challenges affect women from minority communities, including a scarcity of employment opportunities for women from Afro-Guyanese communities, the extremely heavy burden of care shouldered by single mothers, and a disturbing culture of domestic violence, often fuelled by poverty and unemployment in their communities. Women feel that domestic violence cases are not treated seriously by the criminal justice system. Additionally, women’s participation in political processes remains well below levels of equality.

Current anti-discrimination legislation and policies are insufficient to address discrimination, exclusion and ethnically based bias. A new and robust anti-discrimination and equality plan of action is required to be applied across all sectors of society to break down the barriers that have become ingrained in Guyana.

A bitter and destructive political environment has infected the wider society and is failing the people of Guyana. It must give way to a climate of truth, reconciliation and compromise.

Reforms must be far-reaching and highly consultative. However, consultation and process must be time-bound and action-oriented, and must lead to concrete, achievable outputs that ensure non-discrimination and equality.

Promises must be delivered upon, including the urgent creation of five credible human rights commissions, to deliver change to the lives of individuals, families and communities and put in place new foundations upon which to build. An open and constructive dialogue on inclusive governance remains an essential component of this process. The Government of Guyana is urged to take the lead in initiating such a dialogue, however, political will must be demonstrated by all parties.

Here is the link to the complete Report http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/pdfid/49bfa6ec2.pdf:

Source

The system condemns Guyana to the status of a donkey-cart economy

Posted By Stabroek staff On March 24, 2009 @

5:05 am In Letters | 15 Comments

Dear Editor,

I agree with much of what Ms Gay McDougall said in your report (SN 22.3.2009). The problem is not necessarily explicit racism and blatant discrimination, although I do not doubt that these exist today and in the pre-1992 period. Rather, the marginalization emerges because of the predominance of intra-group social networking that is not truly multi-ethnic. If Indian Guyanese dominate the PPP, as they do, then they are likely to dominate in the government. And given the pervasiveness of the intra-group social networking, a class of Indians would win most of the state contracts and emerge in many of the top jobs. This outcome is further deepened given the tendency for Indians to also dominate (relatively) in the private sector.

Intra-ethnic networking also played a significant role in the marginalization of the Indian Guyanese population during the PNC days. The PNC enhanced this relationship by building up the army, the civil service and the police through primarily one ethnic group. Therefore, what you saw in those days was the pattern of African Guyanese predominance in the PNC being projected at the national level.

Furthermore, the recent court proceedings in the Roger Khan trial have indicated that these problematic intra-group/ethnic mobilizations have put in motion self-defeating path dependence (this means outcomes today based on policy choices in the past – the 1970s and 1980s) and this will continue to occur until a totally new unit of the army is created. This new unit must never ever be influenced by the existing unit. Furthermore, this self-defeating path dependence would require that the PPP find its next group of dubious characters when the next wave of violence starts because – as recent events demonstrate – the Guyanese military and police were more capable of dismantling Roger Khan than the political criminals and masterminds. Of course, a new round of self-defeating path dependence was put in motion by the harmful relationship between the PPP and the dubious characters.

Should the AFC win the election and Indians stick with the PPP, we will have a reversal of roles and nothing substantial will change, although I believe there will be some improvement over what you have today (as I do believe the AFC leaders are decent people).
Addressing this perverse and adverse outcome would require a movement from the so-called multi-ethnic party to a genuine multi-ethnic government via a power-sharing constitution. This can never be done within the context of the tinkered 1980 Burnham constitution. In addition, law-makers have to be elected via a first-past-the-post system and not be chosen by the top guys in the PPP, PNC or any other political party for that matter. At the end of the day – given the present structure – the party leader will select party representatives (for Parliament) who have an established track record of sycophancy and obedience to the leader and the party. Let the people elect their representatives in each party.

Also, a first-past-the-post system allows for independent regional politicians to emerge. An independent politician would not need to work through the PPP and PNC. We know that by the time one becomes a parliamentarian of these two parties one is brain lazy. These parties naturally produce brain lazy people because of the warped incentive structure for promotion to parliamentarian, whereby one is promoted not because of ideas and accomplishments but for being able to group think and be loyal to the leader first and country second. Both of these parties are suffering from the group-think syndrome. The leaders choose their sycophants in such a manner that no one is available to second guess them. As a result, Guyana has suffered from bad policies since May 26, 1966.

Another outcome of the current political structure where group think and intra-group networking predominate is that significant inefficiencies in the system are engendered. Such inefficiencies retard the aggregate productivity of the economy (economists measure this aggregate productivity by something known as total factor productivity) and economic resources are used in sub-optimal ways. For instance, they spent US$200M to make a sugar factory in Skeldon that would just maintain the current growth and living standards of the sugar workers.

By building a sugar factory they have specialized in being poor by producing a product that is at the very low end of the global hierarchy of products. Moreover, the income elasticity of demand for sugar is low. Meaning as the income level in the export market increases (primarily Caricom as the EU market wanes) there will not be a concomitant increase in income growth from producing just sugar. However, we all know as we get richer we desire a car and we consume more energy. Therefore, the rate of return on the US$200M would have been higher had it been used to convert the sugar-base to a bio energy-based industrial complex. Thus it is clear US$200M is very high for a donkey cart economy such as ours.

There was no one to second guess the policy makers as they all thought alike. In the end, US$200M will add nothing to the aggregate productivity growth of the nation; rather it would maintain the current penury living standards of the masses.

The point is, the political system engenders inefficiencies as does the group think syndrome, as party interests are promoted above the country’s interest. Moreover, these two perverse outcomes emerge because of the destructive nature of intra-ethnic networking that has condemned Guyana to the status of a perennial donkey-cart economy and third world basket case since May 26, 1966!

Yours faithfully,

Tarron Khemraj

VIEWPOINT: Gay Mc Dougall should be investigated

Friday, May 1, 2009
Source

TODD MORGAN: Gay MacDougall, the U.N Independent Expert on minority Issues has done considerable damage to race relations and democracy in Guyana. Worst yet, she has done irreparable damage to the high U.N. office she holds. It goes without saying that she has also fundamentally compromised her own credibility. Henceforth, Gay McDougall will become known for her partially, where should be impartial; carelessness, where should be meticulous; and irresponsible, where she should be judicious.

McDougall’s Partiality – The Report filed by McDougall reads like excerpts of the racialised anti-government letters written in the Guyana press and hate blogs. If McDougall was indeed an independent Expert she would be studied the ways in which the opposition has used race-based discourses as political resource, rather than as objective expressions of injustice.

Instead of analyzing the race-based narrative of the counter-democratic forces as a strategy of political competition, McDougall treats them as ‘objectives texts’ which must be used as legitimate documents. No expert on Guyana would do this. Worse yet, no impartial Independent Expert would read one set of narratives while marginalizing others.

Any impartial expert in a conflict would take the time to present a comprehensive perspective of the factual situation that exists on the ground. In doing so, the expert would exercise a high degree of professionalism by accurately representing all dimensions of a conflict. This particular expert, however, found one side guilty. Quite fantastically, instead of presenting the complex sociological situation in Guyana, Ms. McDougall laid all the blame on Indians and the PPP. In simple language, this U.N. expert displayed clear bias for the opposition, and one ethnic group.

The expert’s bias can be clearly illustrated by looking at the way she deals with the armed forces in Guyana. Although Africans up about 30% of Guyana’s population, they make up over 90% of the armed forces. All reports prior to McDougall’s have rightfully seen this as wrong. Gay McDougall, however, uses the dominance of Africans in the Military against Indians when she says that Indians are afraid of the military because of their ethnicity. This is a particular egregious instance of this Independent Expert’s aggressive partially.

McDougall’s Carelessness – Ms. McDougall is a Yale Law School graduate. She knows the difference between hear-say and facts, and the difference between allegations and evidence. Most of all, she knows that great care should be exercised in the collection of evidence in getting a solid understanding. Despite her training, Gay McDougall spent three days in a country of 83,000 square miles separated with endless rivers and interior regions. Three days.

She was apparently ill during one of those days. It appears therefore, that her investigation lasted two days! McDougall could have only arrived at her conclusions through one of three procedures, namely – (1) the sociology and politics of country is so transparent it could be read from the most cursory of inspections; (2) she held several (round-the-clock) focus group meetings/hearings and heard pretty much the same story; (3) she arrived in the country without adequate preparation and instead of engaging in wide-ranging fact-finding, she confined her conversation to one segment of the population.

The first option is not possible. Guyana is not transparent. No matter how small, no country can be so read from the hotel window, even under Western eyes. The Caribbean is known for its complexity.

The second option, that is, several focus group meetings were held in the 2-3 days research visit in Guyana, did not happen. We know this because the government of Guyana has publicly stated that it sought consultations with Ms. McDougall but were unsuccessful. Her meeting with the President was ceremonial – a matter of protocol, not investigative.

It must be that Gay McDougall’s fact finding mission in Guyana developed through the third strategy, namely conversation with one group, or more accurately, one segment of one ethnic group.

A clear illustration of McDougall’s carelessness can be found in her representation of the spatial structure of Guyana. She complains about villages being dominated by one group without properly describing the circumstances which led to this. She also neglects to mention that since 1992, Presidents C. Jagan, J, Jagan, and B. Jagdeo have distributed about 70,000 house lots, and the most new housing schemes are multiracial. McDougall could know this because she only visited Georgetown and Buxton.

This is utter and unforgivable carelessness for anymore, but especially for an official from a High office on the United Nations.

Irresponsible Report – The last thing that United Nations should do is to allow its offices to be used to legitimize violence, albeit under the name of resistance. Gay McDougall’s report clearly gives succor to counter-democratic elements in Guyana who have been engaging in wanton killing and even in massacres. The U.N. has not been in that business before, and it should not start now. The U.N. should ask McDougall why she did not go to Lusignan, the village that was massacred. In the political logic supported by McDougall, the massacre (of Indians) at Lusignan was understandable, if not justified.

McDougall spent three days in Guyana and had some conversations with a small group of people. She obviously did so through a prism of pre-analytic and politicized dispositions. She then filed an Expert Report!

Gay McDougall will no doubt go on to another case and file another report. It might very well be better than the one she did on Guyana. But one thing is for sure. Her report will be the basis for deepening antagonisms in Guyana.
This is very unfortunate because Ms. McDougall could have really used the multilateral authority of the U.N. to move to Guyana one step forward. She chose not to do so, and for that must only be credited with rolling back race relations in a country that is trying hard to be better.

The U.N. should appoint a small team of Independent Experts to investigate McDougall’s partial, careless, and irresponsible report.


Posted by De Parrot at Friday, May 01, 2009