-The government, since 1992, has failed miserably in bettering the lot of
the many farming communities
Dear Editor,
As our country again reel under massive floodings, I wish to
specifically address the situation in the Mahaica and Mahaicony Rivers
and to express my opinion that the fate of the hardy inhabitants of this
productive region is now been permanently sealed.
Even if the government spends more billions of dollars, as it claimed to
have done in the immediate past, on the so-called improvement of
draining the East Demerara Water Conservancy (EDWC), it will not suffice
and the Mahaicony and Mahaica Rivers, and even the Abary River, will
always be inundated at times when the rainfall is above normal.
Political rhetoric and corruption have overshadowed and outdone the will
and commitment to genuinely help the people of these areas. One can
clearly remember the G$500 million contract which was awarded a local
firm a few short years ago to strengthen the dam along the EDWC. The
project ended with a weaker and more vulnerable dam. The company
continues to receive mega-dollar contracts. No one has been brought to
book.
It must be noted here that the Demerara Coast is sandwiched between the
Atlantic to the north and the EDWC to the south. The EDWC spans an area
of approximately 100 square mile - 3/4 the size of the Gaza Strip of 139
square miles. The EDWC Dam is presently in a most precarious
position and with ‘La Nina’ looming on the horizon, and to be
dutifully followed by the May/June rains, I have great doubts in the
capacity of the powers that be to prevent the breaching of the dam and
the widespread flooding of the entire East Demerara and nearby villages
in West Berbice.
With every rainy season, more of our hardworking agricultural producers
are dragged under poverty, thanks to a government which claims it cares.
We have been inundated in the past with news about how many millions of
dollars have been spent to improve drainage (and in some cases,
irrigation) of specific areas within the agricultural belt, but all
these are reduced to zero once these rains come.
If indeed the humongous sums have been spent in bettering the drainage
system, why is it not working?
The answer is very simple: the money was expended and a few became
richer. Some in authority have rightly earned nicknames such as “Mr.
Ten Percent” and “Mr. Twenty Percent.”
The Minister of Agriculture often has the effrontery to go and meet with
the farmers and express his sympathy at their plight and outline to them
the additional programmes which the government will undertake to improve
their communities. There is always no shortage when it comes to the
amount of money this ‘caring’ administration will spend to ensure
there is no flooding during the next rainy season, if one is to believe
the constant lies churned out by those in whose hands the fate of
thousands of hardworking, decent citizens lie.
The time has come for the farming community to give the Minister and
others the cold shoulder whenever he visits their areas. They should
simply not attend any meetings with the government officials because
they are an absolute waste of time.
The government, since 1992, has failed miserably in bettering the lot of
the many farming communities, which have repeatedly been flooded over
the years. Probably, if the ethnicity of the farmers was different we
would have seen real progress with the drainage of those communities.
For the farmers in the flood-prone areas, there is no end in sight. The
political rhetoric will continue to play in their ears as general
election approaches.
The farmers will be promised all kinds of programmes and assistance to
make them better but at the end of the day, they are going to be worse
off than the previous rainy season. Remember, we are in the era of
Global Warming (or Global Cooling?) and such things as flooding are just
going to get worse.
Small wonder the Rice Producers’ Association (RPA) bereft of any kind
of intelligent leadership and academic capacity cannot really represent
the few farmers in its membership.
The RPA has been used as a mobilization and organisational tool to get
farmers to vote for the present regime at every general election. It is
an organisation which was used as a tool against the PNC when it
governed.
It is a political organisation which has done absolutely nothing for the
farmers.
It would be most interesting if the RPA can tell us of its achievements
since 1992 and how these achievements have positively impacted on the
farmers and, by extension, the country.
The RPA should also let us know why it has so zealously supported the
overcapitalization and over re-tooling of the rice industry, by several
private farmers, at a time, even without the present massive flooding in
the rice districts, when the rice industry will record negative growth
as a result of the continuing massive slump in world rice prices and
massive increases in the cost of inputs such as fertilizers and
pesticides. The visionless leadership in the RPA comes about because it
is deprived of basic intelligence and commonsense.
The farmers are better off without such an organisation which cannot
provide them basic representation and leadership.
The time may have arrived when the farmers in Mahaica, Abary and
Mahaicony Rivers should file a Class Action suit against the government
for continuously flooding them out, destroying their crops and livestock
and reducing them to beggars - year in, year out. I think they have a
winnable case.
Lall Kumar Ramsingh
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
