Guyana, A Crippled Giant

The Caribbean Is One Nation.

Guyana National Flag

“If we (the community leaders) have failed to comprehend the essence of the regional integration movement,” he told the conference, “the truth is that thousands of ordinary Caribbean people do, in fact, live that reality every day…

“We are,” he had declared, “a family of islands nestling closely under the shelter of the great Co-operative Republic of Guyana. And this fact of regional togetherness is lived every day by ordinary West Indian men and women in their comings and goings…’’

 Errol Barrow, July 1986

When Errol Barrow made the statement that we are, “a family of islands nestling closely under the shelter of the great Co-operative Republic of Guyana. And this fact of regional togetherness is lived every day by ordinary West Indian men and women in their comings and goings…” he was probably envisioning a Guyana that by now would have taken its rightful place in the true development of the Caribbean Nation.

We at the Mahogany Coconut Group are convinced that if Guyana had not been trapped in the politics of the maximum leader, as was the case under Forbes Burnham, and then under the race based politics of the current PPP-Civic group, this resource rich country could have easily been in the forefront of rescuing our region from the high food import bill and its vast lands could have been the home of thousands of Caribbean nationals, who needed a real stake n the region. Imagine if returning Caribbean nationals from the Diaspora were offered affordable land in Guyana as an incentive to spend their golden years in this wonderful country.

The genuine ability of the Guyanese people to be excellent hosts and their genteel disposition, are endearing traits of a people, who have not been well served by their political leaders from either the Afro or Indo Guyanese end of the political spectrum. Power based on race or ethnic considerations has never benefitted the national good and whether Guyanese care to admit this; the simple truth is that Afro Guyanese are convinced that there are rapidly becoming second class citizens in their own country.

Hence all the natural resources, charm and graciousness of the Guyanese people may very well be squandered on the altar of politics and ethnic negatives. To have survived the sometimes unbelievable ruthlessness of the Burnham era, only to replace it with an equally unbelievable divisive race based regime is perhaps one of the greater tragedies of the modern Caribbean era.

Until these unfortunate circumstances are defeated, Guyana will remain the crippled giant of the region