Dear Editor,
It is for the better that a political luminary, a legal stalwart, spoke. Others saying what he said would be sure to attract the reflexive wrath of those who contend that everything in Guyana possesses the immaculacy of perfection. A former Speaker of the House, Senior Counsel, political group leader and contender, and defender of the social compact pointed to Guyana’s criminal justice system. (SN, July 04). Now, if another Guyanese had said so (guess who?), then the heavens would have crushed his or her head. Weak men at the helm have their rear to protect, their reputation (what kind, please?) to maintain.
As is customary, I did not proceed beyond the bold, in-the-eye, SN headline. “Near collapse” is more than a disturbing state. It is of a present crisis creeping towards a catastrophe. Backlog. Shortage of finders of fact, a barren wilderness where seekers of truth is concerned, possibly much more not thrilling. When a bona fide seeker of truth is found, his output held out as truth that inspires (sez who?), more than consternation emerges. Great fear prowls this square of 83,000 miles still. Per Justice Akbar Khan: there is darkness upon darkness. Good luck, Guyana.
Whatever Senior Counsel’s definition of the criminal justice system, I am sure that he cast the widest net: police, ancillaries, other officers of the court, related pivotal offices of the State, tiers in the realm, perhaps much more. These suffice for today’s purposes. The level of confidence in many of the layers is at rock bottom. When our lawmaking body is the subject of derision, our men of the law are concluded to be lawless, including some who hold high places in the legal pecking order, and the little people scurrying about busily with one job (and others on the side), then there is not only a crisis in the system. There is a crisis of confidence in the entirety of the system itself. Rickety. Shambles. Dilapidated. Antiquated. And, of course, violated daily.
Middlemen and touts and insiders come to mind, and they are outside milling about in the well-manicured lawns. Are they still? Inside the buildings, there is a whole culture seriously at work. Need a document on the run, forget about Federal Express, and one that did not exist before could be in the grasp in a jiffy after the proper consideration has been finalized. Faithful defenders of the system will howl to the moon about anecdotal, hearsay, circumstantial without circumstances. Some-body in this country is pretending at being hard of hearing, or a human offshoot of one of those fabled Japanese stone creatures.
When Senior Counsel, and venerable law firm eminence grise, said about the criminal justice system has to be fueled, driven, and accelerated by either his own experiences or that of his own people, likely to extend to his peers. I am, therefore, in the best company. That is, if they will deign to be seen around the likes of me. Senior Counsel should know of those complaints to the sleuthing arm of the criminal justice system that never get off the ground, but which get entangled in the whims and caprices and contrivances of men (and women) with considerable influence in their hands, and much more on their minds. What is usually on their minds are never what could be classified as misdemeanors, but what goes all the way to capital heights.
I head into the sunset, leaving this parting note behind. In America, there is that lovely ditty about ‘all men are created equal.’ In Guyana, the judicial equivalent is that all men and women have their own limitations and environmental obstacles to deal with, and their secrets to conceal as well. By the way, happy fourth!
Sincerely,
GHK Lall
