Ramotar defends Jagdeo’s major deals
President Ramotar addressing the gathering
President Donald Ramotar chose to use the occasion to remember the death of former President Cheddie Jagan at the Babu John Cremation site yesterday to lash out at the “detractors” and “opposition media”.
Addressing hundreds at Port Mourant, Ramotar told the gathering that Jagan’s ideals will “always be relevant in our society” and the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C).
“He (Jagan), in his time, was able to find answers to the most complex questions of the day and he was able to predict the answers and guide our country and party on the correct path.”
Ramotar added that Jagan was able to protect himself from “becoming bitter towards many, many people who betrayed him, because of his ideology that held and guided his life.”
“His principled positions was always one of uniting our country, fighting against all of the divisions and working to bring the working people together, to bring us close—united so we can maximize our efforts in the developmental process,” the President added.
The Guyanese leader noted that more often than not, Jagan was attacked “but he stood his ground and lived his life on those principles embedded in the party. He refused to compromise in colonialism and refused to turn Guyana into a Neo- Colonial state…preferred to be imprisoned than to go in that direction”.
Ramotar stated that there were detractors back in those days as there are today.
He noted that Jagan was viciously attacked from all corners “and everything he and the government attempted to do was attacked with all kinds of nonsense being thrown”.
He recalled how the University of Guyana was “denigrated and referred to as the Jagan Night School and that Black Bush Polder was attacked viciously and some farmers (when the area was created) were asked to boycott it and not take up lands there.” “They criticized the Bank of Guyana, too, and when we took over the National Park…they called us Communist—every single thing, they found reason to attack the government,” he declared.
OPPOSITION MEDIA
The President chided the “opposition media” noting that there seems to be nothing that the PPP/C Government is trying to do to develop the quality of life in Guyana without it coming into a barrage of attacks, “without us being accused of corruption and all kinds of things under the sun.”
A section of the gathering
The One Laptop Per Family Programme (OLPF), he noted was really an idea to ensure that the country was not left behind with the rest of the world, technologically,
“They accuse us of all kinds of corruption, but in reality, it was a public tender. The first tender for 27,000 laptop computers being produced had to be tendered and re- tendered…11 companies submitting, three of which were found to be compliant and a major company, Haier, was awarded the contract”
Ramotar added that he and Komal Chand, along with Janet Jagan in 1996 “had the good fortune…of visiting the headquarters and factory of that company…and then we would have already seen that the company was on the cutting edge of technology.”
He stated that because of the amount of computers that Guyana is procuring from Haier, the company is considering the establishment of a factory here to assemble computers for the Caribbean and North America.
DETRACTORS
“But our detractors do not see anything good in that. They do not want to have any kind of development in this country, because they are working from the philosophy that if things get bad…it will be better for them. But let me give them the message from this forum, from the site that we cremated Cheddie Jagan—that will never, ever happen in this country!”
Ramotar also lashed out at critics of the Amaila Falls Hydro Power Project and stated that the company that will build the project has built more than 15 hydro power projects in the world.
He noted that the company will build and operate the project for 20 years and then hand it over to the government.
“Clearly, it brings for us a lot of benefits because it will offer us a possibility of industrialization.”
But the detractors, he noted, “are either short- sighted and they cannot see Guyana evolving into one of the leading countries in the region…”
The Marriot Hotel was another topic he raised as one being the centre of attention for critics. And the Ansa McAl Project in the Canje Basin was discussed.
“We are not talking about affecting our chain supply for food. …if we get the project going, it will be one of the biggest projects to integrate Caricom—to make this area (Canje), a centre, probably bigger than Point Lias in Trinidad. But many of those that write nonsense—they probably have never even gone into Canje before,” he noted.
He added that these are the same things Jagan faced in his time and that now the detractors are on a campaign to “vilify Bharrat Jagdeo, but if we succeed to get these projects going, it will largely be thanks to Jagdeo”.
Speaking on the airport contract, Ramotar noted that Guyana is becoming an in-transit destination for many and that only certain sizes of airplanes can land in Guyana.
“We have to extend it (the runway), and doing that was a technical team from the Ministry of Works that was involved in all the negotiations. All of these things are being done openly but our detractors want to make them appear illegal.”
He warned Berbicians to “remember their attitude when we started to build the Berbice River Bridge”. “Remember how they opposed it, but today it takes less than five minutes to cross the river”. He urged Berbicians to see the detractors for what they really are “and not allow them to retard progress in our country”.
DICTATORIAL OPPOSITION
The Opposition, he noted, has a tendency of being dictatorial and “even though they are not in government, we see them demonstrating that dictatorial quality that they have in parliament. The PNC/APNU in collaboration with the AFC, just like they did with Cheddie Jagan in 1964, want to replay that card. But that again will not happen this time.”
Parliament, he added, had a glorious tradition in the past, but today the opposition is “trying to subvert the Parliament”.
They “were talking about winners taking it all, now with the Committee system—we always gave them five and we took five—now they want to give us four and they’re taking five [members]”. These are clear signs, he noted, “that the leopard has not lost its spots and we must be ready to deal with them.”
Would Dr Cheddie Jagan have had Guyanese learned about these secrect deals by way of the foreign media?
Would Dr Cheddie Jagan have ever got himself mixed up with the likes of Fip Motilall?