General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party, Dr Bharrat Jagdeo on Sunday urged supporters of the party to use social media to fight back against those who seek to distort the track record of the government and spread misinformation.
In his speech at Babu Jaan in Port Mourant, Berbice at an event to celebrate the life and legacy of founding members of the party, Dr Cheddi and Janet Jagan, the General Secretary recalled when the PPP lost the general and regional elections in 2015.
“And trust me when I say…somehow in the past, we let the narrative from the other side overpower us and it led to our demise in 2015.
“In 2015, they were controlling the narrative; they used social media to distort everything that this party stood for.
“They even denigrated and shamed our track record of progress; they spoke about corruption as a massive campaign tool and we did not enough in 2015 to fight back against that narrative and it led to our demise,” Dr Jagdeo said.
And now, with the country going to Local Government Elections in June this year, Jagdeo urged Guyanese to join the fight on social media.
“We will fight tooth and nail every single day to speak about the record and the achievements of this party and if we don’t do it; if all of you who are here don’t set up a Facebook page or an Instagram page or something else and join that fight, they will succeed again…because they have some in the media who support this narrative,” Jagdeo said to hundreds of PPP supporters.
He criticized the local media for not highlighting the inaccuracies published in the 2022 State Department Country Report on Human Rights Practices in Guyana.
“So today, when we fight the naysayers, many people think we’re intolerant of criticism; we’re not intolerant of criticism, we don’t hate NGOs; we are just fighting to defend our records…
“They want us to stay quiet so they can distort our track record again but not again, it’s not going to happen; I want all of you here to join in that fight,” the General Secretary said.
