Earlier this month, a ceremony was held to mark the 40th anniversary of the bombing of the Son Chapman, an incident which sparked inter-racial violence in the Linden area, resulting in the large scale movement of communities. The ceremony included speeches by Robert Corbin, the PNCR leader, and Hamilton Green, Mayor of Georgetown and at the time the PNC general secretary.
Not to be outdone the PPP last week issued a statement captioned "PPP members victims of PNC atrocities" and recalled the deaths of Fr Bernard Darke in July 1981, Bholnauth and Jagan Ramessar whom the party dubbed the "Ballot Box Martyrs" in July 1973, Michael Forde in July 1964 and Balram Khandi in July 2002.
The statement recalled too that during those dark days of the 1960s 176 people were killed, 920 injured and 1400 homes were destroyed. The PPP has also organised a set of commemorative activities in Georgetown, Berbice and Essequibo.
All these incidents are from an age that it would pay us as a nation not to forget but, equally, not to dwell on. There is no value in casting blame as each side could no doubt come up with a long list of atrocities committed by the other on its members and supporters. It is an exercise that would lead nowhere and only serve to keep our people divided.
A more profitable exercise would be to unite our people in working to improve our standard of living which in comparison to the other Caricom states seems to have retrogressed while theirs has steadily improved.
With national elections due in less than two years, the Guyanese people should instead reflect on the progress that has been made since 1964. According to figures published by the World Bank, Guyana's per capita income between 1964 and 2002 moved from US$290 to US$860 with the best year being 1997 when it reached US$890. During the same period, neighbouring Trinidad and Tobago rose from US$740 to $6750; Barbados from US$460 to US$7850 and Jamaica from US$470 to US$2, 104.
More revealing is the movement of national income per capita between 1964 and 2002. Again according to figures from the World Bank, between 1964 - 85 under Forbes Burnham the national income per capita rose from US$290 in 1964 to US$510 with the best year being 1980 when it reached US$780; between 1985 -1992 under Desmond Hoyte it declined from US$510 to US$430 with the best year being 1986 when it stood at US$530; between 1992-1997 under Cheddi Jagan it moved from US$430 - US$890 and from 1997 - 2000 under Janet Jagan it declined from US$890 to US$860 with the best year being 1997; and under Bharrat Jagdeo from 2000 - 2002, it has remained at US$860.
And do not be tempted to go back to the fifties for the situation was the same. Between 1957 and 1964 under Cheddi Jagan the country also did not grow. In local dollar terms in 1957 the per capita income was G$386 and in 1964 it was G$389, the best year being 1961 when it was G$390.
While one can nitpick about the appropriateness of these numbers one cannot but accept that they show the country's undeniable trend of retrogression when compared to some of our Caribbean partners. Thus it would be absurd in the face of these facts to talk about which regime has done well and which did not. The numbers indicate that none of them has done well and to talk about better and best is ridiculous.
We can during the next twenty months to the elections spend our time arguing about who overthrew whom with imperialist support; who wanted to bring communism to Guyana; who supported Burnham in the rigging of elections; who destroyed the economy over three decades, who wrought political destabilisation by burning sugar cane; who uses disruption and violence as an instrument of political participation and who benefited from whose investments.
These are all issues that point to the undeniable fact that our poverty is founded on a bedrock of political destabilisation of one form or another. The basic rationale for disruption may have changed over time but at no point was our political system able to cope.
A more fruitful exercise could be in trying to agree on a plan that would lift us out of our poverty and the best way of implementing that plan and developing a form of governance that gives each of us a chance to share in the nation's prosperity.
We owe it to ourselves and to the generations yet to come to devote our energies to devising a system that works for "we the people."