GUYANA-POLITICS-Prime Minister condemns opposition’s ‘desperate attempts at race-baiting.

GEORGETOWN, Guyana, Prime Minister Brigadier (Ret’d) Mark Phillips has chastised the opposition coalition A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) and affiliated groups for what he described as their desperate attempts at race-baiting in the hope of inciting civil unrest.

He was responding to a letter issued by a group called the Institute for Action Against Discrimination in which the purported author, Lelon Saul, who identified as the secretary of the group, claims that the administration is pushing Guyana to the ‘brink of civil unrest.

Over 80 Guyanese nationals, including legislators, lawyers, community activists, and trade unionists, wrote to the United States Vice President Kamala Harris, requesting that the Joe Biden administration intervene urgently in addressing what they describe as “escalating social, racial, economic, and political injustices” against Afro-Guyanese and others who do not support the ruling People’s Progressive Party (PPP).

Phillips said the author of the letter appeared to be under the misguided belief that sending the correspondence to a US Representative using false claims would trigger a US intrusion into the affairs of Guyana, which is a democratic sovereign state.

“Mr. Saul is like so many of the delusional men and women in the failed APNU+AFC regime, who failed to deliver a ‘good life, especially Afro-Guyanese, whom they now misguidedly seek to exploit for political relevance.

“I wish to also remind Guyanese that the author is a former senior officer of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) who later served as Chief Executive Officer of the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CHPA), where he failed to implement a viable government housing program,” Prime Minister Phillips stated in his letter dated November 23.

He further reminded citizens that in less than two and a half years in office, the PPP/C Government rescued the housing development program and turned it around. To date, Phillips said, 11,000 house lots and low-income houses have been issued, and the beneficiaries are over 50 percent Afro-Guyanese.

Additionally, the Prime Minister said every relief grant paid by the government saw Afro-Guyanese benefitting, payments made in the sugar industry benefitted over 20 percent of Afro-Guyanese, and many Afro-Guyanese are involved in rice, other crops, and livestock, and have benefitted from flood relief and other support programs for farmers.

Phillips charged that Saul was connected to the APNU+AFC, which “is on a treacherous road that they hope will create civil unrest and allow for the breakdown of democracy in Guyana, which happened under the PNC in the 70s and 80s”.

He pointed to what he said was the APNU+AFC’s continuous push for civil unrest through attacks on the media, blockading government officials from engaging with communities, unruly behavior in the National Assembly, and adopting a confrontational approach to the President when there should be discussions on key national issues.

“Plans to railroad the country were not achieved in 2020, and certainly law-abiding Guyanese along with civil society will continue to forcefully reject the deceptive actions of the APNU+AFC and call for political maturity which will ensure greater unity and prosperity for all Guyanese,” the Prime Minister declared.

In the letter written by the Institute for Action Against Discrimination, a copy of which was obtained by the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC), the Guyanese nationals are also urging the intervention of several regional and international institutions, including the US Congress and the Congressional Black Caucus; Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders; the European Union as well as the United Nations, the Commonwealth, and the African Union.

“We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, are gravely concerned about the escalating social, racial, economic, and political injustices leveled at African Guyanese and others who do not support the governing People’s Progressive Party (PPP) regime of Guyana.

“These injustices have moved beyond geographical borders to Guyanese living in the Diaspora, particularly those who vociferously denounce these atrocities. The situation has recently ballooned to unimaginable proportions with PPP activists extending their malice beyond Guyana’s borders and into the Diaspora, towards President of the US-based Caribbean Guyanese Institute for Democracy (CGID), Rickford Burke,” they wrote.