LET TRUTH RINGS BROTHER

GECOM and US Embassy choose IRI: Really!

Dec 20, 2019 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon 0 Comments

GECOM’s application for assistance to the US Government channeled through the US Embassy here has resulted in the International Republican Institute (IR1) being chosen as the consulting firm to GECOM.
Really! Google anything you want to learn about anything and you will find it.
Google the IRI and you will find countless controversies about it involving formidable accusations of engendering coups in Third World countries and providing strategic advice to very conservative governments.
There are four super-power players in the world – USA, China, EU and more weakened version of a superpower, Russia.
In a world of Thucydidian struggle for power, each international player is going to choose friends for geo-political, geostrategic reasons and justify the relationship. The IRI justifies its consultancies to autocratic regimes based on the analysis that its work is to help the birth and growth of democracy.
Interestingly, the two totalitarian superpowers –China and Russia – do not use the word “democratic” in their foreign policy marauding; the US and EU do. But do their criteria fit the model of democracy?
The most graphic juxtaposition in the world for decades would be Saudi Arabia and Cuba. Saudi Arabia is a nightmare state; Saudi Arabia is a rogue state; Saudi Arabia is an unmodern, undemocratic, frightening state with a twisted, demented monarchy.
Cuba on the other hand certainly does not meet the criteria of democracy. It is not an open, free state. But successive US and EU governments have close relations with Saudi Arabia and hardly any with Cuba (except a handful of EU countries and Canada).
In the US and the EU you can lose your job in both the private and public sectors by just a half word that insults homosexuality.
In Saudi Arabia, you can go to jail for being homosexual. In Saudi Arabia, women are not only treated as second-class citizens but the law recognizes them as such. In Cuba that would be unthinkable.
So who is democratic and who is not? No doubt the US government chose the IRI because its mission statement is to help democracy in the world. Founded by President Ronald Reagan (a racist president), the IRI is closely aligned with the Republican Party.
It is the opinion of this columnist that some of the most dangerous politicians in the entire world are Republican lawmakers that sit in the US House of Representatives and the Senate. You have to look very hard to find men and women in any legislature around the world that are so war-prone and so insensitive to race insults.
The Republican Party consists of a substantial number of right-wing extremists who are unfit to be part of an enduring democratic state like the USA. And what about attitudes to non-white races?
If in Russia, Serbia, Croatia, Poland, non-white people are ridiculed by the rulers there, though unacceptable, there are sociological explanations for such mental depravities.
Russia has never had even a momentary rendezvous with democratic systems. The rule of law, a free press, competing poles of power, acceptance of different ways of life are phenomena the Russian people never had a fleeting experience with.
How do you explain the racist attitudes of top politicians in an enduring democratic nation like the US?
One could be wrong about the IRI presence in Guyana. It can come and offer professional help to GECOM. But should one be oblivious to its “questionable” work in so many other countries?
My preference would have been for a non-political consultancy that has no political connections whatsoever. I guess the decision is already made; GECOM will now have a strong IRI contingent working with it.
What needs to be done is for the Opposition Commissioners of GECOM, the opposition parties and civil society to closely monitor the activities of IRI personnel in GECOM and the wider society. The media should take note of the background of the IRI and pursue its investigative tasks though I wouldn’t have much optimism about that.
I don’t want to name names because I am not interested in that direction but Guyana’s journalism is poor and I don’t see any improvement in the near future. The role of the media is to inform the society about what takes place right in their midst. Guyana’s media is not even halfway there.
This columnist can name more than a dozen stories that need investigating and that in any country the media would be like flies on ointment, but not Guyana. The IRI has a controversial profile. It is now in Guyana working with an institution that is vital to the preservation of democracy – the sacred, incontrovertible right to vote.
The media should keep an eye on the IRI.