37 dreams after recent nightmares in Covid Guyana..

 

Dreaming in these Covid times could help after the nightmare of waiting for Elections 2020 to be concluded , and nightmare of the continued Jagdeo leadership of Guyana.

Dreams are good to write down.  To remember dreams instead of reliving the madness as people in their own coping ways try to sanitize some of the people who were voted out in 2015 as they come back in 2020, sanitised also with the cover of niceness and newness.. but while we know that niceness and newness can co-exist with the ugliness, that in the end.. the ugliness overwhelms.

So inhaling some of the same sanitiser , remembering dreams instead of nightmares.. 

1. Guyanese will stop beating children.
2. Teachers will not beat children in schools.  
3. The Minister of Education will sanitise the teachers and parents who want to beat children before opening back Covid. Those who want to keep beating children can go and work in the Oil and Gas industries or emerging hemp industry after marijuana is decriminalised.
   
4. The Minister of Education will resign if every child at primary level cannot read and write at the end of 2021.  
5. The Minister will randomly visit every school and use the washrooms to ensure that there is running water and clean sanitation.
   
6. Every child with a disability will have access to quality free education tailored to meet their needs.
   
7. Every adult in Guyana who voted  - dead voters, voters who were outside of Guyana or in another spiritual dimension.. every adult who voted will make sure they know to read and write. 
8. The literacy test will be to read and explain some relevant part of the Constitution. If the Constitution is irrelevant, they can read and write the words of two of their favourite songs by Guyanese artistes.  Of course, creolese can be used. However, creolese is not English with wrong grammar
   
9. The Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport will bun white Supremacy , show his support for anti-colonial struggle by recycling all his suits and red ties. He will wear locally designed clothes at every formal function, even if it has red in it, and have the name tag of the designer attached. 
10. The President and other Government officials might want to bun white supremacy in the same way and find new costumes to wear for different functions.
    
11. All family portraits of Government officials will show the male holding the babies, while the women stand up next to them. If the Government officials are in same-sex partnerships, then the children will be held by the partner who is the Government official. If both partners are Government officials, then the children will be held alternately in different pictures
    
12. The Minister of Governance will hire a team of three of the most vocal supporters of the PNC's position that the elections were fradulent.  The Minister can also do a daily Zoom reading of their letters to the editor and facebook posts and describe the initiatives which show she is paying attention and addressing their concerns about inequality, injustice, racism.
    
13. The Minister of Governance will put the motion to the National Assembly to advise the President to convene the tribunal to investigate  allegations of child sexual abuse against Minister Manickchand’s nominee on the Right of the Child Commission, Kwame McKoy .  Yeah, I not using the same high quality of sanitiser that so many others are using.
    
14. The Women and Gender Equality Commission, the Rights of the Child Commission, the Ethnic Relations Commission and the Indigenous Peoples’ Commission will have persons who subscribe to the Human Rights Conventions which Guyana has agreed to even if Guyana has not bothered with enforcing them in law. 
    
15. The political parties will have child protection policies and policies against gender based violence for their members. The Government Ministries will have child protection policies and policies against sexual harassment and other forms of gender based violence in place. Ministers and other senior officials will not be immune from such policies.
    
16. There will be pavements on all nice new roads where cars are speeding to avoid the traffic lights on main roads
    
17. Guyanese will stop littering. Those who litter will be invited to attend discourses from different political party experts about why Guyana is in the mess it is in
18. The Prevention of Discrimination Act will be amended to prevent discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity.
    
19. LGBTIQ+ will have the same rights as everyone else, regardless of they are PPP or PNC or otherwise. 
20. Guyana will admit it has an alcohol problem. Taxpayer monies will not be used to buy liquor at public events. Non-alcoholic beverages from small business owners will be served instead.
21. Those who want alcohol could check the car trunks of those Government officials with alcohol problems
22. Guyana will stop marketing alcohol as one of its tourism attractions. 
    
23. There will be 100% use of  glass, ceramic and other utensils which can be washed and re-used. Guests can help with the washing up. 
24. Plastic bottled water will not be used at public functions. No plastic bottles of water on tables and so.
    
25. The Minister of Human Services will invite an organisation like Transparency International Guyana to state how she should deal with the potential conflict of interest of being a Minister, and being leader of the Guyana Hindu Dharmic Sabha which does humanitarian work. This would protect the members of the Sabha of allegations of nepotism. Or of not getting anything from the Ministry as a way to protect the Minister from the allegations..
26. The Ministers will take public transportation - the min-buses - at least once a month The Ministers of Public Infrastructure will use minibuses and speedboats and so at least twice a week. 
27. Each NDC will have a space to use for cultural events which do not include noise nuisances
28.  Each NDC will have an annual literary festival. Each municipality would have a library, and people who use it.
    
29. There will be at least the same number of news headlines and attention to renewable energy, as there is to Oil and Gas. There will be the same nice photos, trendy events and organisations and so on for both
    
30. Since the PPP and PNC were not interested in justice for the extrajudicial killings during the last PPP regime, then citizens will organise to document the cases, and to bring charges.
    
31. All acting appointments..Chancellor, Chief Justice, Commissioner of Police,  etc will be confirmed.
32. We will talk about and treat  anti - Black, anti-Coolie, anti-Indigenous racism.. talk about them all, not one only.
    
33. We will refer to the Minister of Amerindian Affairs, as the Minister of Indigenous Peoples' Affairs until such time the Government that is not a PNC thing or PPP thing.
    
34. Government funds will not be used to open back Guysuco. Direct cash transfers will be done to all of those who were affected and sell of the assets or convert the lands and factories to grow things like hemp and so.  Sugar and oil are not as good for the world as they used to be.
35. There must be accountability in the health sector.  State violence is not only from the police
36. All Government officials will show selfies as they wait in line at the public health facilities or use the toilets and beds and so at the public health facilities for whatever reason.
    
37.  No citizen should have to go beg for money to get medical attention. All private hospitals and doctors working privately will ensure that patients who cannot afford the treatments can have access to the skills and facilities in the public health care system. That should be easy especially for the doctors who work both private, and public.
    

Other dreams lurk, police accountability, transformation of the justice system. Some dreams are other people's nightmares, some dreams can be shared across other differences.