PPP REMEMBERS VICTIMS OF PNC ATROCITIES

The People’s Progressive Party recalls the several atrocities committed by the PNC during the month of July. 

  Balram Khandhi, a school teacher and member of the Progressive Youth Organization was shot and killed.

Among the several atrocities was the killing of Father Darke, a Jesuit priest, who was knifed to  death on July 14, 1981 by thugs associated with the PNC during a peaceful protest action in close proximity to the Brickdam Police Station. Father Darke was at the time a schoolteacher attached to the St. Stanislaus College and a part-time photographer. He was brutally murdered for having committed the “crime” of taking out photographs of peaceful picketers being beaten by thugs associated to the now infamous House of Israel cult, headed by US-fugitive Rabbi Washington, at the time closely connected to the then ruling PNC.

Also killed on July 16, 1973 were two supporters of the PPP, Jagan Ramessar and Bholanauth both of whom were fatally shot by members of the armed forces. These two were among a large group of persons protecting ballot boxes from being carted away when the Police opened fire, killing the two men in the process. These two later became known as the “Ballot Box” martyrs. The PPP also salutes the memory of Michael Forde who was killed in July 17, 1964 when a bomb, intended for Freedom House, exploded on him. He was at the time attempting to remove the bomb that was planted in the bookstore at the bottom floor of Freedom House. The PPP recalls that dreadful period of our history when a total of 176 people were killed and 920 were injured. Over 1400 homes were destroyed by fire. It is worth recalling that police investigations revealed that there existed at the time organized thuggery that was centrally directed. The Commissioner of Police, in a sworn affidavit, spoke of ‘the subversive and criminal activities of a criminal gang attached to a political party known as the People’s National Congress’.

And even more recently, on July 22, 2002, Balram Khandhi, a school teacher and member of the Progressive Youth Organization was shot and killed when someone opened fire during a post-PPP Congress reception at a secondary school in Rose Hall,  Corentyne. Balram was due, within days of his death, to leave for Cuba to pursue higher education. These murderous acts serve to remind Guyanese of a dreaded past, one in which the PNC regime was quite prepared to sacrifice the peace and well-being of an entire nation in order to obtain political power, which it eventually did by crooked means in 1964. And, in an attempt to consolidate and perpetuate that power, it unleashed a reign of terror and brutality to silence those who opposed its draconian rule.