Comments From the Peeper and a Letter To The Editor

These comments are from today's Kaieteur News:

The first contains excerpts from Kaieteur News columnist, Peeping Tom:

This past week the 'writetopeeper' mailbox was filled with tales of doom and displeasure. Keep the suggestions flowing, folks! The Peeper will try to at least comment on the acceptable suggestions as to how we can improve Guyana .

Last week, Mr. David Jenkins was suggesting that Uncle Freddie provide an e-mail address available so that his fan club can contact him. This week Jenkins is fuming and has extended and open challenge to another of our columnists, Stella Ramsaroop. He writes:

“Dear Peeping Tom Sir,

I am writing to you hoping that you could tell me what's going on in Georgetown .

Can you say if Stella has protection in the media circles in Guyana , or the portion of news dealing with her is not posted on the Internet? I had sent the following letter to the major newspapers, but so far, not a squeak from them on this person. I am baffled that she gets away with open attack on Guyanese personalities.”

I have read your Open Challenge, David, and while I cannot say exactly why your letter was not published, I rather suspect that the editors may be uncomfortable with certain words which may open them to libel action.

I would suggest that you modify the second word of the first paragraph. I am sure that with some minor other adjustments, the editors may be pre-disposed to carry your challenge.

I am however intrigued by your challenge but you are not the first person to ask the vintage looking lady to publish a recent picture of herself in all the papers. Sweet and adorable Stella has done more than that - she has given us her life story and when you read it, tears come to your eyes.

To think that in the richest country in the world someone has gone through so much pain, just breaks your heart. Hers is a story of Oprah and so I urge that readers be considerate of Stella.

I will, David, mention through this column the other challenge you made to Stella. But as I said this feature is really for suggestions as to how we can improve Guyana . Since, however, your challenge has not been published by the local media, I thought that I would help you out.

Your second challenge to Stella is for her to come and live in Guyana for six months prior to the elections and three months after.

You know, David, I am not as pessimistic as some people are about the forthcoming elections. The results are a foregone conclusion and should any party decide to misbehave, then I am sure that the international community will be willing to impose visa sanctions on those persons and their families.

This is one of the things that I have written about before and which I intend to raise with the international diplomatic community. I am therefore not envisaging trouble both before and after the elections.

Here's a portion of a letter to the Editor:

Dear Editor,

Is it I or is everybody fed up of opening the newspapers and seeing more columns written by so-called columnists?

I don't care about the politics in this country, be it who wins the upcoming elections, both the Indian and the Blacks would have to work a full eight hours each day and at the end of the month, take home the same salary. What's the big fuss.

It started out all well with “Peeping Tom”, and then Uncle Freddie and Robert Persaud joined in. Now its Stella Ramsaroop and whoever else who care to share their thoughts about politics in Guyana . It's just too much to read in one day.

As it relates to Stella, when I first saw the column with the pretty woman above the article, without even reading the headline, I thought to myself, eh heh, this is going to be one with a difference, probably addressing the issues of women that we are faced with each day.

But lo and behold, she is on the same wave band like Uncle Freddie and the others. Come on, Stella, as Peeping Tom said a few days ago, “Politics is not your thing.”

Why can't these columnists address something of mere interests and facts to the Guyanese people, like the economic situation in the country or even human interests?