A call by longstanding PPP executive Hydar Ally for the withdrawal of invading Russian troops from Ukraine – including Crimea – has sparked a backlash from some of his colleagues.

Though no longer considered a Marxist/Leninist party, many of the old guard of the PPP who supported the Soviet Union’s repression of Eastern Europe have defended Russia’s seizing of Crimea and its invasion of Ukraine on the ground that NATO and its proxies were encroaching on Moscow’s borders.

Ally, a former permanent secretary adopted a different position in a September 10 letter in Kaieteur News.

He said in part, “It is unfortunate that this war has been allowed to drag on for such a prolonged period without the tangible intervention of the  UN Security Council.

“Meanwhile thousands of innocent lives continue to be lost in what can only be described as a senseless war. The solution, in my view, can only be found in the complete and unconditional withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukrainian sovereign territory, which must include the temporarily occupied Crimea”.

This letter triggered criticisms from his colleague on his Facebook page but Ally, the father of Minister of Public Service, Government Efficiency, and Implementation, Zulfikar Ally  held his ground.

He said “I am entitled to my views like anyone else who may have views on matters of national or international importance. I am aware that my views may not always be correct, in the same way as I do not hold the views of others to be superior to mine. I am prepared to live by my convictions regardless how intolerable they may be to others.

“In the marketplace of ideas, there must be respect and tolerance for the opinions of others. In the final analysis, there can be no greater freedom than the freedom of speech and the freedom to express ideas and views”. 

In an earlier post, he asked: “What manner of man will destroy cultural and intellectual property in the name of war? Wars, if at all justified, should be fought on the battlefield and not in civilian and residential areas killing and injuring innocent men, women and children in the process. Something is fundamentally wrong when thousands of lives are lost and cultural and intellectual infrastructure are damaged in an attempt to create a facade of victory. It is time to end the war in Ukraine which should not have started in the first place had better sense prevailed. The war has now become one of the longest in European history, surpassing that of World War 2 with no end in sight. Where is the collective conscience of humanity in all of this? I am reminded of the words of the English philosopher Edmund Burke: The only thing necessary for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing”.

One of the defenders of Russia’s war on Ukraine is former President and PPP General Secretary, Donald Ramotar. In a post on Ally’s page he did not respond on the Ukraine issue but raised other matters.

“How come you are not critical about the genocide in Gaza, The West Bank and East Jerusalem

How come you are silent on the attack on Iran and the killing of more than 150 girl children and the attack on weddings

Do the lives of innocent farmers in Lebanon mean nothing to you

And what about the extra judicial killings of people in little boats in the Caribbean”, Ramotar asked. In relation to his last interrogative it is instructive that the PPP/C government has not condemned the extra-judicial killings by the US navy in the Southern Caribbean and Eastern Pacific.

In a letter in Kaieteur News on February 6th this year, Ramotar wrote: “In a few days we will be commemorating four years since the proxy war against Russia began. Ukraine has been used by NATO to try to inflict a military and an economic defeat on Russia. Some two million persons, mainly Ukrainians have died in that war. Yet European NATO countries continue to arm Ukraine in what is now obviously a futile attempt to defeat Russia. Since it is Ukrainians that are dying, the European states seem not to give a damn. This is the extent of their concern for Ukrainians”.