Asked at his press conference to comment on the PPP General Secretary's call for Guianese support for an expanded $200 million Development Programme, and the projects on which the increase will be used, also bearing in mind Mr. Berrill's warning that the country's borrowing power cannot now exceed $110 million, Hon. Dr. Cheddi Jagan gave the following reply:

We want $200 million as soon as possible. There are some items which are left out of the Development Programme which can be included in the new plan. For instance, the East Coast Road, the Georgetown Hospital, the hydro electricity scheme at Tiger Hill on the Demerara River, an airport terminal building, a teachers' training college.
There can be also an intensification of industrialisation and a quickening of the pace of development in the drainage and irrigation sector.
The East Coast Road is estimated to cost about $25 million, the whole electrification programme with hydro about $45 million, the Georgetown Hospital about $8 million, the airport terminal building and the teachers' training college about $1? million, expanded drainage and irrigation about $20 million, and industrialisation unit $12 million.

The announcement was recently made that Booker Bros. McConnell & Co. Ltd., the London
holding company with operations concentrated in the British Colonial Empire (British Guiana, the West Indies, Central Africa) had made in 1959 the huge net trading profit of some $6 million after taxes. This was an increase of nearly $1.3 million over the previous year's trading profit. I n addition, there was a net capital profit of a little more than $769,000 in 1959.
It is interesting to note that the trading profit of $6 million was arrived at after $867,000 was set aside for the increased replacement cost of land, buildings, plant, machinery, ships, etc.
The directors recommended that the total distribution to Ordinary shareholders should be some $2.3 million free of income tax for 1959. The Preference shareholders had already received
dividends for that year amounting to $105,840.
Unappropriated profits retained in the company at the end of 1959 amounted to $26.97 million, an increase of $3.73 million since December 31, 1958.

Victor Hugo once wrote that great perils have this one beauty, that they bring about a fraternity of strangers.
The grave perils confronting the Guianese people today are those of colonialism (British political rule) and imperialism (foreign economic domination). This is not to say that these dangers are of recent origin On the contrary, they have been the inseparable companions of all those who are proud to call themselves Guianese ever since this country fell under the yoke of European rule. What is important to note, however, is the fact that the Guianese people have only become really conscious of these perils within the past decade.
Why did the realities of colonial conquest and exploitation take such a long time to dawn upon Guianese people?
The fact is that prior to 1947 there never existed a political leader or party, equipped with a knowledge of the theory of scientific socialism which could have been applied to the education and organisation of the broad masses for the termination of foreign rule in Guiana.
Because of the tireless efforts of the People's Progressive Party over the past ten years, during which time it faced savage opposition from the privileged and also experienced betrayals, the masses have been able to grasp the fundamentals of socialism and to discover the reasons for their poverty and want. They can no longer be deceived by exploiters or by their political agents, clerical defenders and editorial servants.
Credit for this great work of political enlightenment belongs solely to the PPP. Of even greater historic significance is the fact having created a popular awareness of the traditional perils, the party was able to bring about in 1953 the fraternity of the overwhelming ,majority of Guianese ? those of all ethnic groups who work, manually and mentally, and alone produce the national wealth, but as yet do not enjoy the full fruits of their labour.
The exertions of the colonialists and imperialists and of their resident agents and native allies to destroy this fraternity are now well known. Some measure of success has been achieved by the
oppressors because they were able to discover within the PPP means of disuniting the Guianese people. Although traitors were kicked out of the PPP, a fake movement was set up which usurped the genuine Party's name and only abandoned it after experiencing retributive justice in the form of defeat at the last general election.

October 14, 1960

Dear Mr. D'Aguiar,

I have read your statement of last weekend with great interest. I address you this open letter
so that you may clarify certain issues in the public
interest.
You say we are Marxists and without Marxism we have no policy, that Mr. Burnham's PNC has no policy, that your policy is economic dynamism.
Firstly, let me say that Marxism is not a dogma but a guide to action and that although the PPP is not Marxist party, it has a definite policy. In the field of politics, it has written from its very inception the word ?independence” on its mast head; in economics it is for a planned economy.
Like India and Ghana, it believes that only a planned economy can generate rapid economic growth and necessary social changes. For planning purposes these countries provide for four sectors ? public, cooperative, public private and private.

Underlying Similarity

You said that Mr. Burnham has no policy, that yours is economic dynamism. What is economic dynamism? I humbly submit that Mr. Burnham's PNC has a policy. It's the same as the policy of the NDP and UDP of John Carter and Rudy Kendall with whom Mr. Burnham is now allied. It's the same as yours. It's indistinguishable from the policy of the imperialists whose theme song and panacea for all our economic and social ills are foreign capital(ists) and the free enterprise system. This underlying similarity is what drives you all together to gang up to defeat us.
This is the cold economic fact. Let's be honest, and forget for a moment the emotional breast thumping, the flag waving, all the blahs about freedoms, and big words like ?economic dynamism.? You're all the same; the only difference between you is a difference of personalities. You all want to be generals.
We saw this underlying similarity not too long ago in the political field. In the Constitution Committee, Mr. Tasker of Bookers and Mr. Burnham of the PNC basically sang the same tune ?
with minor variations on the theme ? internal self government only, Upper House, and proportional representation. Does it make any difference that Tasker is White and a foreigner, and Burnham, an African and Guianese? Incidentally, this was more or less the same stand taken by the so called Constituent Assembly, Big Business and the Sword of the Spirit (now Defenders of Freedom).

The press is becoming more and more blatantly mendacious with respect to the activities, the outlook, and the intentions of the Majority Party, Through letters to the editor, editorials, and slanted news reports the Majority Party and the Government of which it is a part are viciously attacked. Only now and then does an article slip through giving unqualified credit for good works. And for the most part atrocities against the PPP are given pride of place.
One of the latest and choice bits of fabrication was broadcast by the British Guiana Broadcasting Service last week stating that plans were underway to begin a large scale immigration of people from the Indian state of Kerala to colonise the Rupununi district.
The news was compiled by the representative of the Guiana Times News Service, and it was a whopper, easily disproved by the Minister of Natural Resources. But it is just one of the many slanders perpetrated against the Majority Party. The Minister immediately issued a statement saying that there was no truth whatsoever in this report. The question of immigration from India has never been considered.
The report that an Indian official was coming to examine secondary school staffing problems was also untrue. Hon. B.H. Benn termed these reports "a mischievous fabrication" and called upon the Guiana Times News Service to substantiate its report. There could of course be no substantiation of these reports, since they came out of thin air, out of a mind with a vivid imagination, and a flare for the extraordinary and the bizarre.