Dear Editor,
I have read with total disgust Mr Lall’s letter captioned “Stabroek News has been vilifying me” (07.12.19) which also appeared in the Chronicle. I honestly cannot comprehend his reasoning. What unending campaign by Stabroek News to vilify him? He has done the vilifying to himself very nicely. How has he been slandered and libelled by Stabroek News? Another mystery, because he is also fully responsible for such.
The public is not “unsuspecting” Mr Lall, the public knows what you did before it hit the newspapers and many thanks to Stabroek News for printing our letters and opinions on your matter. We the people are the ones responsible for the letters that you have labelled an “ugly scheme” by Stabroek News. Your comment about an “ugly scheme” would have been more forceful and accurate if you had named the public as the villain and not the medium merely responsible for voicing our concerns.
Mr Lall, the only newspaper in Guyana which one could count on to be balanced and serious is Stabroek News followed by the juicy and witty Kaieteur News for recreational reading. As everyone knows the Chronicle is the “government’s” press. I am sure every morning the president reads Chronicle to feel good about himself and his party, but he pays more serious attention to the Stabroek News for the truth because he needs that in order to be the effective president that he already is.
For a man in Mr Lall’s position, he has acted very poorly. In the civilized world a minister of the government would have made a public comment on any incident as soon as possible – especially an incident of a negative nature- in order to try to regain the confidence of the people. We all make mistakes in life and no one is exempt but how we handle those mistakes is what makes or breaks us. Mr Lall’s poor handling of his mistake has definitely broken him. He has further shamed himself by trying to place blame on the media.
For your information Mr Lall, you are mocking the entire police force by saying that “the competent authorities are currently trying to determine whether you used your firearm in an appropriate (should have been in an inappropriate) manner”. You don’t need a law degree or years of police experience to figure that out. Meet the average person on the road and he/she will tell you that you used your firearm indiscriminately. Your drew your gun on an unarmed man and fired shots. That goes way against the laws that govern licensed firearm use. I am not sure if your intention was to commend or mock the police force. I think the latter..
You have made a very big mistake and your follow-up was just as bad. Do the only decent thing that is left and resign.
Yours faithfully,
Lewis Hale
