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Reply to "Did Castro Deceive Cheddi Jagan? The Ranji Chandisingh Story."

Bibi Haniffa posted:

I heard that Chandisingh was broke and needed the money.  

You heard wrong. Chandisingh did not need Castro's money in order to support Burnham. I knew him personally. When the PPP sent him on trips abroad and gave him "per diem" funds, on his return he would submit an expense report that included the cigarettes he smoked and hand back leftover funds. No other person, except perhaps the Jagans, did that.

More importantly, in international circles Chandisingh was regarded as more Marxist-Leninist, more indoctrinated, than Jagan. Not for nothing was he Editor of the PPP theoretical-ideological journal "Thunder".

So, the Cubans said Burnham was anti-imperialist and Marxist-Leninist and Chandisingh concurred. He agreed to give unconditional support, not critical support, to Burnham according to his conscience. That is why he left the PPP after the party officially adopted "critical support", that is, about four months after the meeting with Castro in Havana.

His mind was so saturated with Marxism/socialism that Burnham immediately made him a teacher at the Cuffy Ideological Institute on a modest salary. Even when he bacame Minister of Education he did not earn a super-salary. He continued to live in his ordinary two-storey house on Waterloo Street until his death. 

So, take money out of the equation. Ranji Chandisingh always lived a modest and quiet life, his two weaknesses being books and cigarettes.

FM
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