Priya Manickchand and Luis SuÁrez

Most, if not all the commentators who wrote on the SuÁrez biting incident believe he has a psychological problem and should seek help. The factor that they took into consideration was that the biting thing occurred three times on the field. Many psychologists took the view that it is probably something that goes back to SuÁrez’s childhood. Those who believed SuÁrez, including the citizenry of his country, Uruguay, were embarrassed when SuÁrez retracted his bite denial and apologized for the biting. Priya Manickchand falls into the same category as SuÁrez. I first observed Manickchand’s behaviour when she was a student of mine at UG. She hung out with a group of quiet young ladies, including Manzoor Nadir’s daughter. It was plain for the teacher to see that in certain circumstances, she came across as someone easily given to cuss-down mode, though her personality on campus betrayed that character fault. When she became a Minister, my eyes caught her first speech in Parliament. This was unbelievable. Manickchand performed her delivery as no other person in the history of Parliament. You looked at this woman in the National Assembly and she was not performing her maiden speech – she was cussing down. And to make it more shocking, she was gesticulating in a manner that was common to a certain section of Bourda Market. Since that maiden speech, she has behaved like that in every other session in Parliament, the latest being her unbecoming attack on Jaipaul Sharma. One day, Manickchand turned up in the High Court to hear her benefactor’s libel against me. I refer to Bharrat Jagdeo. During the recess, she went straight up to Mark Benschop to complain about something uncomplimentary his web page carried on her. And it was the usual market approach with the accompanying gesticulations. SuÁrez only bit thrice. But Manickchand is a serial offender. The latest person to feel the effect of her teeth and tongue was the US Ambassador. But her teeth and tongue have now catapulted her into the history of infamy. Her fisherwoman conduct at the US Fourth of July celebrations was not only sickening, but has nastier dimensions than the SuÁrez biting incident. SuÁrez was on a field where passions were running high and players were capable of doing things that they would not normally do. Manickchand has no excuse. A country cannot treat a foreign ambassador in the manner that Manickchand did to the American Ambassador, in his home, at an official governmental function. This may have no precedence elsewhere in the world. The United States Government must immediately intervene because this is not the type of treatment foreign envoys should be made to endure. What Manickchand did, does not happen in diplomatic circles around the world. Leaders and Ministers do express themselves strongly at such functions, but always, the language is academic and diplomatic. Always the leader of the host country and his/her Ministers must show respect, because that is what the envoy expects from a host government. There was not even a modicum of diplomacy, subtlety, euphemistic words. Manickchand was in a cuss-down mood and she cussed out the head of the American diplomatic mission in this country It is most definite that Ramotar, Luncheon, Teixeira, Rohee and others are going to rally around Manickchand. This is the nature of the PPP. Like the millions of atrocities, immoralities, depravities and abominations the PPP Government have committed since 1992, the PPP will sit this one out. The PPP is going to tell its leaders that the storm will pass over. But the US Government and the people of Guyana should not accept this kind of sickening conduct. What Manickchand did affects the people of this country. It will have deleterious consequences for the citizens of this land if the US decides to retaliate. What Manickchand did will cast a long shadow. The usual talk in the highest circles of the Caribbean will be – well what do you expect from such a country; that is Guyana. We are so looked down upon by the Caribbean and now Manickchand has added fuel to the fire. The talk will be about lost, hopeless Guyana even in higher circles outside of the Caribbean. Remember it was just a few years ago when then Prime Minister of Jamaica, Bruce Golding called us an international beggar. So will the Guyanese people allow President Ramotar to retain Manickchand as Education Minister? We should not. We should demand the immediate sacking of this troubled woman. If the PPP cares about Manickchand, it should immediately begin to seek psychological assistance for her. If not, as sure as night follows day, she will do it again. She is a female SuÁrez.