Dear Editor,
I refer to SN’s ongoing high cost-of-living series, and make this confession. I am drawn, then repelled. How and where fellow citizens are hurting in the latest chapter of what makes for piercing reading. Repelled because there is so much hurting, yet so little doing. In chapter 14, the anguish continues without letup. As their cries register, I recall the most infamous German of all during that war of yore. He used to instruct that the blinds of his train carriage be pulled down, so that he couldn’t see the devastation of bombed out areas, when passing through. The people are crying, SN is reporting, others are highlighting; yet only averting of the gaze follows. The head-of-state is locked securely in his own world: soundproof – he hears nothing, but what he wants to hear, what pleases him, feeds his ever-expanding sense of himself, the self-created myths. The myths are all worshipfully watered by the brigade all lined up for such purposes.
Meanwhile, there are shorthanded, struggling, sickeningly fearful people in Guyana, this oil paradise, this GDP Garden of Eden, this national economy that is a Miss Universe beauty. We have oil by the oceans, so one would think that Guyanese could, at least, get a drink, afford one, to slake their parched existences. If a drink (not rum nor Ovaltine) is a daily trial, then a few morsels of food look out of reach. Such is, indeed, the case, for many Guyanese. But, we have some oilmen-President, Vice President, clingers and graspers-who have mentally isolated themselves in their ivory towers. Yes, the President is busier than a wasp pressing the flesh in many regions, but his hand is always empty, his care devoid of leadership authenticity, or what is helpful. In this time of the grand riches of oil, there are those inconvenient Guyanese articulating their pain, embarrassment, only to count as unwanted and unseen spillage. What they used to call spillage years ago is today’s collateral damage. Its brutal impacts are not on infrastructure or property, but on people.
In their own words from the SN series: “Everything gone up…” And “This the highest them prices ever go…” And “Everything gone sky high… And, “this is the highest dem prices ever go…” Four speaking for twelve, who all spoke the same language of hardship and heavy distress. It is of fellow citizens, from vendors to shoppers, younger to pensioner, crying the same lament. One interviewee notably said that “the Govt doing as much as they could.” This citizen is an outlier, given the positions and conclusions of most others; he most likely knows more of what has eluded so many other Guyanese.
I would like to say that government and leaders have done all within their power, but that would be exaggeration, even what qualifies as a patented falsehood. Some things have been done, but when compared to nonhuman sectors, the nonpoor segments, there is a heavy imbalance, which is frightening all by itself. Just ask a question of neighbour, or fellow worker, or some family member. The refrain is constant: so much, so little, so much digging by the fingernails. As an aside, I read that the Finance Minister is of the position that Guyana is now well-positioned for more loans. To do what with, sir? Build more roads? Create those prospering opportunities for the insiders near the top (and the top itself) to capitalize?
Clearly, we are now this hard version of a tale of two nations: one rich, the other impoverished. And, a tale of two peoples: those who have their fill, and those grasping at empty. Considering all this, and all the speeches, postures, and ready defenses, I recall Goya’s masterpiece: the sleep of reason produces monsters. When reason slumbers, more than logic flees. Basic humanity, compassionate feeling buries itself alive.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall