Topography: minibus, Steenbakkerijstraat

Painting on a minibus waiting to collect passengers in downtown Paramaribo. Photo by Nicholas Laughlin; 24 February, 2010.

The painting is a portrait of Desi Bouterse, leader of the military regime that ruled Suriname after the 1980 coup, responsible for the December Murders in 1982 and the Moiwana Massacre in 1986. In 1999 Bouterse was convicted in absentia in the Netherlands for cocaine trafficking, but Surinamese law protects him from extradition.

He remains politically active and popular with some Surinamese, as this painting suggests. “Basi joeroe” is Sranan for “Boss’s time”.