[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 61 (Wednesday, May 17, 2000)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E742-E743]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   HONORING THE HON. CHEDDIE B. JAGAN

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, May 16, 2000

  Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, on this the 34th anniversary of the 
independence of Guyana, I rise to honor the memory and celebrate the 
achievements of the Hon. Cheddie B. Jagan, the former President of 
Guyana, and one of the most committed and dedicated political leaders 
in the Caribbean region and in the Third World community. Dr. Cheddie 
Jagan, like his contemporary and compatriot, Forbes Burnham, enjoyed a 
political career that can only be described as unique and 
unprecedented.
  Cheddie B. Jagan was born on March 22, 1918, in the village of Port 
Mourant, in the County of Berbice, in the nation of Guyana. He was the 
son of Jagan and Bachoni, indentured plantation workers who had 
migrated from the state of Uttar Predesh in India. Dr. Jagan was to 
retain a profound commitment to the concerns of the rural sugar workers 
throughout his career.

[[Page E743]]

  Dr. Jagan was educated at Howard University and Northwestern 
University in the United States and returned to Guyana in 1946 to begin 
a remarkable political odyssey. In 1950, he founded the People's 
Progressive Party and, in April 1953, he headed the first 
democratically elected government in Guyana's history. In 1957, and 
again in 1961, he became Chief Minister of the Government. In 1964, he 
became a leader of the Parliamentary Opposition, and in October 1992, 
he was elected President of Guyana. On March 6, 1997, this monumental 
political figure passed away at the Walter Reed hospital in Washington, 
D.C.
  Dr. Cheddie Jagan lived in a period of profound repression during the 
Cold War. Regrettably, the government of the United States played a 
significant role in destabilizing the government of Cheddie Jagan. In 
1953, it persuaded the British Government to suspend the constitution; 
in 1955, it helped to split the national movement; and, in 1962, it 
helped to provoke civil disturbances. This tribute is a small attempt 
to atone for this gross miscarriage of justice.
  Through all these political vicissitudes, Dr. Jagan maintained a 
constant and unwavering commitment to the cause of the Guyana working 
class, to the concept of working class unity and to the principles of 
constitutional democracy. In spite of overwhelming odds, Cheddie Jagan, 
like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., ultimately believed that ``truth 
pressed to earth will rise again'' and that ``the arm of the moral 
universe is long, but it bends towards justice.''

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