Dear Editor,
Dr Tarron Khemraj’s letter titled ‘Do not fall for the trap of personality’ (SN, Feb 28) is a message all Guyanese should heed. Worshipping the cult of personality is easy in Guyana. It is a national pastime. It is the nonsense that got us into this abysmal mess. Poor leaders with misplaced messianic ambitions and the gift of the gab were able to lead people into all manner of destruction using their cult of personality. Dr Khemraj is right that institution building is what really matters, not people. But this is Guyana. Land of personality worship. Any regular Joe can show up tomorrow, make some fiery speeches and get some servient types to sing his praise and people will think it is the coming of their messiah. This phenomenon is rooted in ignorance and lack of education. It stems from Guyanese on a large scale failing to internalise and analyse anything with any dedication. A charlatan with the gift of the gab automatically gets a halo for saying nothing if it is done with passion and conviction. Then there is race. People cannot see beyond the rule of race in their minds. It stymies their intellectual integrity and clouds their judgement of men who make brilliant speeches and produce spectacular failure. There are so many other biases, prejudices, impediments, attitudes and cultural artifacts which command personality worship in Guyana. These have all left us bleeding. No wonder con men can swindle large swathes of people into voting for the same old tomfoolery again and again. David Granger’s cult of personality will erase his questionable past for many. The fact that Kellawan Lall can continue to serve as a minister or that Carl Greenidge came 15 votes away from becoming the PNC’s presidential candidate shows the danger of the cult of personality.
Dr Khemraj may not readily accept it, but a large percentage of AFC supporters joined because of the personality cult. It is the inevitable truth about the Guyanese voter. Dr Khemraj waxes supreme on the institutional building capacity of the AFC and I don’t doubt him, but why is it that the PNC conducted the nation’s first partially open primary process to elect its presidential candidate while the AFC used a milder version of the PPP’s draconian process? Wasn’t the AFC supposed to be the PNC in this regard? Doesn’t institutional building start with the institution that wants to commit the institutional building? Frankly, if an open primary (partial even) was conducted, the AFC would have gained a large number of fence-sitting votes. I can’t trust men who talk a good talk, because it is men who talk a good talk who talked us into this corner. Is talking of true democracy enough when actions can speak much louder? The AFC will have its congress to ratify Mr Ramjattan and Ms Holder. Why not call a congress in the first place and let Ramjattan and Holder get picked by the wider membership rather than by a small committee which may be stacked with those who are uncritical? Until significant institutional reform commences at the stage of political parties and how power is obtained at that level, I cannot trust those entities. Even the PNC which made history with its presidential selection process had flaws in its process, namely it was not wide enough and Mr Corbin remains a thorn in terms of the issue of who becomes the Opposition Leader. In addition, hypothetically speaking, in the event of a coalition between the PNC and AFC, who becomes the president? Again, Mr Corbin’s continued presence as party leader is evidence of the broken model we have for political parties. Institutional building must commence from the bottom up before we can experience change as a nation.
Yours faithfully,
M Maxwell
