"Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it"-were the words inscribed over the throne of the late Jim Jones in his Jonestown hideout. (This saying originated from the renowned philosopher, Santayana). This saying directly applies to those in the PPP who seek to discredit Mr. Ramjattan for his courageous stand on many of the archaic and ill-fated Marxist/Leninist views of the PPP. Perhaps, Mr. Ramjat-tan is simply giving 'Critical Support' to his own Party.
This is indeed a retrograde move and is as lopsided as the expulsion, 40 years ago, of former Education and Home Affairs Minister Balram Singh Rai. Mr. Rai had instructed Dr. Jagan to ethnically balance the police force thus causing Dr. Jagan to label him a 'racist'. The dire consequences are well known-especially to the PPP supporters-who invariably found themselves at the receiving end of police brutality (and still do).
Those who stand alone and think for themselves are strong and radiate brilliance like lighthouses to those souls lost at sea while those who follow the crowd will get no further than the crowd. It is relevant to recall that Sir Winston Churchill was the only voice of dissent in 1937 in the House of Lords when Neville Chamberlain, the then British PM, declared that he had prevented war with Germany upon his meeting with Hitler over the Sudetenland territory in Czechoslovakia. The entire world recollects, with deep pain and anguish today, that the lone voice of Churchill was correct.
During the B.O. Adams inquiry into the aftermath of looting and violence following the 1992 election, it was Mr. Ramjattan who single-handedly put both then Police Commissioner Laurie Lewis and GDF Head Joe Singh to the sword. No other PPP lawyer-even those who catapulted to Attorney General status- was even present at the inquiry. It is sad indeed that Ms. Gail Teixeira, a Political Science graduate, who holds the comical position of Minister of Sports, was called upon to deliver judgment against her fellow Member of Parliament. Today, a brilliant mind is deemed un-cooperative with Party dogma and is called upon to lie down and roll over--a hypocritical demand when Guyanese confront their memories and realize that the two highest office holders played a comparatively minuscule part in the fight for Guyana's political freedom. Bharrat Jagdeo had the Presidency handed to him on a platter while Sam Hinds was used to fill the void slot of ethnic equilibrium.
For a country whose newspaper headlines consistently reek of police shootings, bandit killings, armed robberies and foreign handouts---not from Marxist/Leninist donors though-it seems a great waste of energies to squabble over political party structures. This phenomenon, whatever the outcome, has no effect on the proletarian masses as Guyana still remains one of the poorest countries in the Western hemisphere.