President Jagdeo lacks sophistication

Apr 12, 2011 Letters

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Dear Editor,
Jagdeo’s latest outburst at Diamond (“Glenn Lall started the Kaieteur News with back-track money”) convinces me that the President of Guyana is either mentally unbalanced or incredibly ignorant of the protocols/conventions to which he should adhere in keeping with his status as the Head of State! Of this I have no doubt.
For the sake of discussion let us assume that Jagdeo’s problem is the latter. The easily amused among us will excuse his “buses out” at Diamond because he doesn’t know better.
However, this particular situation is more serious than even Jagdeo himself seems to realize, since he has made comments about Mr. Lall which suggest criminal behaviour on the latter’s part.
Let us look at this situation more closely. Jagdeo told his audience that Glenn Lall started Kaieteur News with backtrack money, and that the paper should be called the Backtrack News.
Jagdeo is accusing Glenn Lall of backtracking! As far as I know, the facilitation of the illegal movement of persons across borders (backtracking) is a crime; so in essence, Jagdeo is accusing Glenn Lall of committing a crime!
This is where this situation gets really ugly. If Glenn Lall is accused of committing a crime by no less a person than the President himself, it is clear that the evidence is there to support his claim, or the President is just simply lying.
The President is not in the habit of mouthing off based on pure speculation, or is he? Jagdeo has a responsibility to share with the relevant state authorities all the information he has related to this alleged crime of which commission he is accusing Lall. Failure to do so could actually lead to Jagdeo himself being accused of being an accessory to the crime!
On the other hand, let us once again for the sake of discussion assume that his allegations against Lall are without merit.
If this is the case, we have a huge problem on our hand! Civilised, mature grown-ups do not go around accusing other people of criminal activities of which they have no proof.
This is anti-social, immature behaviour and in bad taste. When the President of a country does this it takes it beyond bad taste and into the realms of dangerously bizarre behaviour (do we have our own Ghaddafi clone in Guyana?). It also forces one to seriously question the mental state of the person, in this case President Bharrat Jagdeo! Once again Jagdeo presents us with a dilemma.
Is his consistently erratic and inappropriate behaviour due to a deep ignorance of how he is expected to comport himself as the Head of State or God forbid, is it the result of his rapidly deteriorating mental state which he and his close advisers can no longer hide from the people?
Simply put, is Jagdeo now suffering from an acute case of megalomania or some other psychiatric disorder? It might be appropriate to recall the saying that “He whom the Gods seek to destroy, they first make mad!”
In either case, we cannot help but once again question the wisdom of Janet Jagan who foisted Jagdeo on the nation, and in turn, we should all be apprehensive about his selection of Ramotar as the PPP’s presidential candidate in the upcoming elections. Even though we may not know why Jagdeo is behaving as he is, we are sure that something is seriously amiss with the President.
What can we do to ensure that the people do not come to more harm from the actions of this man who is obviously either afficted with an acute case of ignorance of the comportment expected of him as president, or/and possibly suffering from mental instability?
It makes no sense trying to teach the conventions of presidential comportment to Jagdeo at this stage of the game. You cannot teach an old dog new tricks!
However, it may be in the nation’s interest to arrange for Dr. Bhiro Harry to do a psychiatric analysis of Jagdeo to determine the true nature of his mental condition; unless we want to invoke Article 179 of the Constitution which states that “The President may be removed from office if he becomes physically or mentally incapable of discharging the functions of his office.”
I have to admit that I am concerned about this only because of how his mental state has impacted his decision to select Ramotar as the presidential candidate of the PPP, rather than through concern for his personal state of being.
In an obviously impaired mental state, Jagdeo has indicated through his actions that he is incapable of making rational decisions.
When Guyanese go to the polls later this year we must all remember that it was he who selected Ramotar as the PPP presidential candidate.
Are we going to vote for a Candidate Ramotar who was selected by Jagdeo whose mental state and decision making ability comes into such serious question?
Hubert Wong

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