Dear Editor,
The Vice President never ceases to amaze (“PPP/C will not allow businessmen involved in “illegal activities” to tarnish its reputation -Jagdeo” (KN August 20). I clear the air first. I know one of the names from close official contact for three years, and a second through his father alone; the third I have read of, and that’s it. The first two (using father as proxy) always knew where things stood, what I stood for, through our sturdy disagreements. A kind of uneasy peace prevailed in their corner, and I thank them for the native wisdoms I gained, while imparting the nonnegotiable(s) that came with the territory.
The record is there, which Messrs. Ram, Nascimento, Hinds, and Singh pored over, with the results speaking loud and unchallengeable by anyone. Anyone! The auditors from Solomon and the staff can speak of their own experiences, and how they assessed all that went on in those three years. So, when the VP seeks to speak of reputation, I suggest, I insist, that he starts there, and look there. For integrity alone, he has the standard for his corporate chiefs and his party. The PPP as a political group could learn, as it makes a move in the direction of some mystical reputation that it does not have, but which the VP magically attaches to it.
I have a word of advice for him and the President, who I rope into this simplest of communications: both of them can learn, too. If the objective is unsullied reputation for party (or person), then be ultra-careful on sources of money accepted. I have extended the same recommendation to my other brothers, those in the PNC. I recognize that I lost, in that these free suggestions, recommendations, and advice are too costly to contemplate. Thus, there are these macabre dances about reputation and “illegal” and the President and investigations.
The VP needs no enlightenment from the likes of me, for he ought to know by himself, that the Guyana Police Force labours under a dreadful wretchedness of reputation, much of it earned. This hurts Guyana. I am hurt by a wounded GPF. I acknowledge the VP’s riposte at the Opposition and its possible agenda that hints that the government cannot be trusted. The words are the VP’s own, but I help him some more. The PPP Government is not trusted, not even by its own; at least, the ones who are still capable of clarity of thought, conscience, and some conviction. Chronic corruptions are responsible.
And I inform the VP that no amount of spinning, no frequency of posturing and distancing can suffice to remove the stain and stench. Further, I regret having to share this with the VP, but I do it to his face, and in the straightest, simplest manner: he himself is not trusted. I don’t; and as much as I try, I can’t, my brother. I just can’t, and I wish it were otherwise with all my heart. Like the GPF, that also is self-created by years of industry in that direction, towards those objectives built on certain kinds of ambitions, which inevitably fuel such harsh conclusions. I know I forgot that a man died in the worst of circumstances, whoever he was, whatever his own reputation. But I do this: we all killed him, we all mowed down his memory, when we are party to these concoctions that comes from the VP about who and what is “illegal” and what tarnishes so-called “reputation. Get real, my brother.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall
