CONFRONTING DIALOGUE

In a truth finding mission scientist and decolonize the mind advocate Dew Baboeram will confront  president Desire Bouterse of Suriname in an interview coming November, about the killing of more than 400 people  during armed events which took place in Suriname in the 80s and 90s of the previous century.

 Dew Baboeram

The murder of his brother John Baboeram, on December 8th1992 makes Dew Baboeram immediate beneficiary of the outcome of his truth finding initiative which seeks reconciliation and dialogue for the

traumas which developed after December 8th 1992 and after hundreds of Surinamese were killed during clashes between a guerilla army led by current parliament member Ronny Brunswijk.

Ronny Brunswijk

and Suriname's National Army led by Desi Bouterse. The stale mate between family members who want justice and have taken up court cases to get Bouterse convicted and the government and people of Suriname who have reelected Bouterse twice and have adopted amnesty legislation, needs to be transformed into a process which allows for truth, healing and understanding.  

plaque with 15 names of   december 8, 1992,victims on Moses and Aaron church in Amsterdam

Baboeram offers  the people of Suriname the option of dialogue  to  deal with  the stale mate  which followed  confrontation in lengthy and costly legal proceedings, which after more than 30 years have not led to satisfactory results for the families involved. Although legal proceedings are valid and a constitutional right,  the  social, legal and political reality in Suriname demands actions which  can transform the legal stale mate  into a process of national and international dialogue to get truth about what truly happened  on the table . The relatives of civilian and military victims of atrocities which took place in Moiwana ,  in clashes with indigenous Tucayana, and in other places in the interior of Suriname, deserve as much proper treatment and closure as those of the 15 people who died on December 8, 1992.

 

The decolonize the mind theorist  Baboeram argues that if South Africans could manage truth finding and move on after centuries of atrocities committed by Apartheid advocates, Suriname must be able to learn from that and find its own way to deal with its own traumas by confronting dialogue.
Hira's initiative, an open letter to the president inviting him to participate in the fact finding mission in a two day interview, has rekindled the flames on the hot debate about Suriname's  human rights issues, legal issues and  has reopened the wounds which for many years were left unattended since discussing them was not done for many years.

President Desire Delano Bouterse of the Republic Suriname

In accepting Baboeram's  invitation the president has not only acknowledged the trauma but also indicated that he wants to be part of the truth finding efforts. 

Baboeram and his team have taken on a mammoth task and are already in the zenith of fierce criticism especially from the advocates of legal proceedings who see the truth finding activities as a useless effort endangering their attempts to get Bouterse behind bars. Sandew Hira  invited everyone  to be part of  the proces of dialogue and calls on the people of Suriname to think hard about what would happen to Suriname and its people if indeed Bouterse were to be arrested and put behind bars. By confronting dialogue now the next generation of Surinamese can put the traumatic events in a proper place and in doing so open up new avenues for development in areas where darkness reigned until now.