Here are two incidents with a common thread. The first came in a recent interview on the Charlie Rose television programme in the USA. Former Secretary of Defense in the Obama administration, Robert Gates, in mentioning the extreme strains of the President’s job, referred to a comment he made to Obama in one of their White House meetings dealing with a number of issues. He told Charlie Rose, “At one point, I said to him, with a smile, ‘Tell me again your reasons for wanting this job.’ It is such a burden.” That took place this week. The second took place some 25 years ago in the Cayman Islands where the country’s political leader, Jim Bodden, was said to have remarked, about the forthcoming election campaign, that his candidates were unbeatable. He said, “I could put up a broomstick in my district, and the people would vote for it.” In Obama’s decision to enter politics and in Jim Bodden’s declaration of power, the common thread is ego, and indeed ego, expressed in self-confidence, is the essential ingredient in a political aspirant in any country where citizens vote in free elections. To follow politics anywhere is to see this. The heavy responsibilities of the job, the wrenching demands of the campaign, including facing personal attacks, and the realization that every four years or so your career is again in question, means that one must come to that process with a solid ego; that’s part of the equation.
Another part, however, is that almost everyone who serves political office becomes noticeably changed by the experience and understandably so. After all, the persons who run our governments, at presidential and ministerial level, are among the most powerful people in these societies. They enjoy all the trappings of power, they are courted on every side, they come in for constant praise, and even idolatry. The press hangs on their every word; ministerial staffers bow down before them; prominent and wealthy individuals seek their company. They are basically an elite group, and it is almost inevitable that they will be affected by these blandishments. It is so not just in the United States of America or in the Cayman Islands; it is so across history wherever we elect our leaders.
The down side of the process, however, is that in many cases the effect on the politician, sometimes in a matter of months, is that he/she consequently takes on an air of omnipotence, or arrogance, often displayed toward the very people the politician is supposed to represent. The pattern is universal and the examples widespread – Juan Peron in Argentina; Franco in Spain; Idi Amin in Africa; Trujillo in the Dominican Republic; McCarthy in the US; Eden in the UK; Fidel Castro in Cuba; Duvalier in Haiti, etc. Absolute power, as the saying goes, transforms, and our own history in Guyana, particularly in the past 25 years, shows many of our leaders going through this alteration. At some point in the past few weeks, a frequent blogger in the local media, operating under the name of Observer, writing in response to a letter about arrogance in candidates in the recent election, said, “During his earlier years, when he was Minister of Finance, Bharrat Jagdeo was a simple and very humble man…but now it seems as though the absolute power which he enjoyed for over a decade has corrupted him. Poor guy. He needs our prayers.” In that reflection, Observer is touching on the change that is often seen in persons entering politics, and the transformation to which he refers is frequent and striking.
It is apparently a consequence of political life that almost all who engage it will come to believe in their omniscience, and will even display that belief publicly for all to see. When I lived in Canada I saw it there and in the US, and later I saw it vividly in Jamaica. I even saw it when I lived in the tiny Cayman Islands, a place of some 55,000 people made up of many nationalities. Two Caymanians whom I knew in the private sector there entered politics, and each won a seat in the national election. We had been friends, often in robust and amicable chats about politics and society and West Indies cricket, but in both cases, within a matter of months, they had become arrogant in conversation and not caring for the opinions of the same people they used to engage previously. I couldn’t believe how quickly it happened, and how total was the change. Our relationship simply withered.
The array of letters and news articles in our media in recent weeks shows a citizenry recognizing that some measure of that transformation has been at work in Guyana for some years now, and it is something that both citizen and politician alike must recognize as well as guard against. Given that persons who go into politics are there with strong egos to start with, the inclination is further bolstered when they are re-elected, cementing their value, and particularly so when the re-election is repeated three or four times as has been the case with us. Indeed, some societies, recognizing the alteration, are unwilling to provide consecutive victories to political groupings for that very reason.
Looking at the political chapters in our recent history, one can see examples, across the board, of this inclination to arrogance, and even omniscience in persons finding themselves handling the reins of power. It appears to be a human failing in mankind and one to which most of us unfortunately succumb. Among the many burdens facing our new selection of leaders, they need to be aware of this powerful factor of transformation, firmly imbedded in the arena they now inhabit, waiting to alter them and not for the best.
