Dear Editor,
Misgivings have surfaced on how the opposition is handling itself in the aftermath of the prorogation assault by, and insult from, the ruling PPP. This does not bode well for either continuity or the future.
When there should be one voice, one body, and one force, it is disjointed, and obviously so. There are too many people running around making too many speeches from too many angles.
Also, it is noticeable that significant individuals are missing from significant events. The colour scheme might be concerning, the fraternity publicly non-embraceable, or the history of old association and old strife still dominant.
Put differently, it is the wrong people, the wrong place, and the wrong time for those absent leading men. Thus, the crowd on Friday had to be content with their own.
There is another aspect of the concern. When the opposition ought to be galvanized into action and omnipresent on the hustings, sowing interest if not excitement, it is content to be a 30 minute presence focused on press releases and polite noises that lack attraction and staying power. Why are its people and machinery not churning through the mud, buttonholing citizens, channelling its appeal?
Is it because this is too much hard sweaty work calling for endless patience and stamina?
The Square of the Revolution should be humming non-stop; let it be a daylong soapbox from which to expound and excoriate and project. Loudly.
The approach should be different for the circles of Stabroek and Bourda Markets, but they should already have been the scenes of serious conversations and outreach, and so too the circles of the National Park and around Guyana Stores.
Why only the armchair comforts and easy streets of press releases and press conferences?
At this crucial pivotal moment, why is there this lukewarm, air-conditioned, white shoe, and white gloved feel to the opposition’s presence, postures, and actions? Why?
Editor, I now say this publicly: I am prepared to be seen, to be heard, to exhort, and to contribute to any meaningful, coherent, and intensifying effort.
Any real serious, roll-up-sleeve, down-in-the-dirt effort can attract my support, for whatever minimal value such may be worth. It is an indication of the extreme abhorrence, the terrible unease generated by the monstrosities of the ruling PPP.
But such physical, vocal, and spiritual identification will only occur if there is a concerted drive to overcome limitations, to overcome circumstances, and to overcome the evils roaming at will in this land. This is how much I want to salvage what is left of this place, this home and hearth.
Yours faithfully,
GHK Lall