LETTERS Burnham and Booker
Sir: I work for Bookers but I honestly believe (so far as one can every judge one's own motives) that this letter is prompted by a sense of shock, almost outrage, and not by economic self-interest.
I found your leading article headed `Burnham & Booker' (12 October) very sad, especially coming immediately after a longer article about order in Britain. When there are as many people of African and Indian descent in influential positions in Britain as there still are people of Indian and European descent in senior positions in Guyana, then perhaps it would be less inappropriate to criticise the recenly dead Head of State of Guyana. But even then to call him a 'megalomanic gangster' would be ridiculous. Dr Jagan, the leader of the opposition, is free; the police are disci- plined and courteous; as a European I feel no fear and sense no antipathy during my visits there; and respect for all races is universal in social, political, and business intercourse.
I personally found the memorial service at Westminster Abbey dignified and beautiful. The new second verse of the British National Anthem and the Guyanan National Anthem both look to the unity of mankind as an ideal and were sung quietly but properly by all those near to me: Guyanese and English alike.
Cynicism is easy but I am not sure it helps.
I have confined myself to things which I know from my own personal experience. I was not in Guyana at the time of Mr Burnham's rise to power; but I understand that the article is totally incorrect to suggest that he had the support, let alone was the 'hatchet man', of Bookers.
Colin Campbell
The Grange, South Mimms, Potters Bar, Hertfordshire
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