As the PPP/C commemorated the 16th death anniversary of party founder and late President Cheddi Jagan at Babu John, Port Mourant yesterday, President Donald Ramotar blasted critics for saying that the party has strayed from the ideals of the Jagans

This was a criticism levelled at a similar event last year by Nadira Jagan-Brancier, the daughter of the Jagans. Jagan-Brancier, though present at yesterday’s event, was not among the speakers at the ceremony. It was unclear whether she had been invited to speak at this year’s event.

President Donald Ramotar laying a wreath yesterday at Babu John in honour of the party’s late founder and former President, Dr Cheddi Jagan. (GINA photo)

Speaking to the large gathering in the PPP’s traditional stronghold, Ramotar wasted little time in attacking the party’s critics, saying that the character of Cheddi cannot be severed from the character of the party itself. He said that a lot of personal characteristics were imbued within the party.

President Donald Ramotar interacts with attendees at the Cheddi Jagan memorial commemoration yesterday.

 

“As we see some of the same forces who fought against him in his lifetime are now trying to champion him against the movement that he created,” he said. “We must recognise that some of them are using their media to recapture a time now passed,” he said, referring to them as nouveau riche and backtrackers.

Ramotar said most of Cheddi’s life was spent fighting for the freedoms of persons. “He was a revolutionary from beginning to end”, he said.

He said many betrayed Cheddi and his party by crossing the floor of Parliament and that he had to fight right wing and left wing opportunism.

Making the point that people want to rewrite history, the President said, “… Nagamootoo asking about debt when debt today is only 48 percent of GDP.” He noted that at the time the PPP/C took office in 1992, the debt was 658 percent. We achieved these things because of the foundation Jagan laid,” he said.

He said that the Opposition want to walk on that constitution. “Today we are seeing the misuse of the parliament. They are trying to destroy our parliamentary democracy. They are passing unconstitutional bills and preventing people from speaking. We are the ones defending the integrity of the Parliament, defending the Constitution and the freedom and rights of the Guyanese people,” he said.

“The Opposition using Linden to accuse Rohee. They went to Agricola. They did that to undermine Parliament,” he said, noting that the Linden Commission of Inquiry  has “completely” exonerated Rohee.

The President said that Speaker of the National Assembly Raphael Trotman was forced to rescind his decision about Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee speaking in the House. “He did not do it from the goodness of his heart. He did it because he had to do it,” he said. He noted that Trotman ignored lawyers’ advice and the ruling of the court on the matter before making an about-face.

Clement Rohee laying a wreath at Babu John yesterday.

The President also spoke about AFC Member of Parliament Nagamootoo “lying” in the Parliament by saying that he did not support the President’s Benefits and Other Facilities Bill when it was being debated in the House in 2009. Nagamootoo had said he supported it as he had no choice.

Budget

“We are working to continue the momentum we already have and to keep our economy growing,” he said. In the coming budget we hope to advance and strengthen the welfare of our people even more. We are planning to create a labour market clearing house and will relaunch the Central Recruitment and Manpower Agency to reach out to job seekers and employers and provide matching placements,” he said. He said that Government will partner with the Board of Industrial Training through apprenticeship programmes.

“We will look again at the NIS and will be unveiling a programme to increase coverage, improve compliance and raise administrative efficiency and improve the financial health of the Scheme,” the President said.

Speaking at the ceremony, Prime Minister Sam Hinds said there is still a sense of sadness at the passing of the Jagans “but also a sense that we could learn from them.” As time passes and old challenges are overcome new challenges come.

The Prime Minister said that during the last 16 months Rohee has been persecuted but he has stood the test. “He never buckled though it was quite a strain on him and I want to commend him for standing up during those months. At these times we dearly miss Comrade Cheddi and wondered what he would have counselled us. I think that he would have called on us to keep the faith in spite of everything that is happening in our country. In spite of those who criticise us…keep the faith in our country and people and in our ability to create a much improved standard of living,” he said. “Cheddi would have called on us to keep on working selflessly to the best of our abilities for the good of our country and all our people,” said Hinds.

“He would have called on us to keep on reaching out as he did around 1990 to 1992,” he said, recalling that Jagan after years of rigged elections and being mocked by many people, called on persons to form the Civic component of the party. “As there were prospects of a free and fair elections he reached out to all those who were ready to work with him and the PPP and thus he created our winning PPP/C alliance,” said Hinds. He said that the PPP/C alliance represented innovativeness in Guyana politically. “In January 1997 when we were thinking of the next elections Cheddi reached out again and brought in a whole range of new people to work with him and the PPP/C. We must reach out and have more citizens casting their vote for the PPP/C at the next elections, whenever they might be,” he said.

“As we work to realise the legacy of Dr. Jagan, more people – even those critical of us today – will see how earnest and honest we are and will come and join with us,” Hinds said.

“Comrades, even as we continue to struggle with the current situation in Parliament, we cannot neglect our work to continue the economic development of our country,” he said. “You can be sure that the budget that we shall present in Parliament within this month will be aimed at continuing the growth and development with which we have been rewarded over the last two decades and which many returning Guyanese have found amazing and satisfying, whatever their political persuasion,” he said.

Hinds hit out at critics who suggest that the Government is not treating sugar and bauxite equally. In making his point to support the contrary, Hinds said that bauxite should have been closed down in 1994 but “we kept it going against what was said to us…we did not close bauxite…we kept subsidising it until such a time as companies came along…to breathe new life into the operations,” he said.

“In sugar, which is at a different stage in its development we have sought to bring about ourselves those changes that would give it a better chance at being profitable,” he said.

But he said that even as the country seeks to refashion the old economic activities they alone will not give the increases in the standard of living that persons would want for themselves. “We have been looking to develop new areas of economic activity…we have been pushing the ICT area and we are also hoping to promote tourism and that is why Government took the decision that the new top of the line [Marriott Hotel] would be a good catalyst for a much larger tourism industry – one that is five to ten times larger than it is now,” Hinds said.

He said that critics of the Government are trying to stir up feelings of xenophobia, referring to protests against the Government’s contractual arrangement of Chinese only workers with the Chinese firm building the Marriott.

“We in Guyana must stay open to the world. We must have relationship with people all over the world,” he said, noting that while Cheddi was a nationalist this was not at the expense of peoples of other nations.

At the 2012 memorial for her mother Janet, Jagan-Brancier urged those who were gathered to visit her parent’s Bel Air house to see how humbly they lived compared to how government officials live at present.

“I really encourage people to go in Bel Air and see the house where they lived because they lived a very simple life; they didn’t have a big ostentatious house that you see nowadays with government officials, party officials, which is a very sad thing, I think personally,” she said.

“To me the most important point [is that]… my parents had very, very, very high moral…standards [and] this I find is very lacking in many of the leaders. My parents… [were] probably the most incorruptible people you would ever find; their honesty and integrity were of very high standards that unfortunately do not exist, or I don’t see it in many of the leaders of the party and of the government,” Nadira said last year.

She said that while the Jagans fought for workers, especially the sugar workers and the poor, the downtrodden of Guyana and the world and stood by them, “certain elements” of the party had “moved away from these very, very important values that held the party together and that makes the PPP what it is.”