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LEST WE FORGET!
The English poet and playwright of the Victorian age, Robert Browning once said, “A man’s reach should exceed his grasp.” This statement means you should seek to improve your situation by striving to go above and beyond. Given the actions of those in the last administration, no one can say with certainty that they went above and beyond their call of duty to help the people of Guyana. This is truly a great human tragedy, especially in a country which is divided along racial lines.
When the leader of the opposition was handed the reins of power as president, many breathed a sigh of relief because he was a young man who many believed would make genuine changes. His favorability rating was high but by the time he left office, it had plummeted. The former president has been the most uncharismatic political leader of the country. He was effectively given a 24-karat diamond political wedding ring, but he gave it away in exchange for greed, corruption and personal wealth. His tenure as president is a tragic tale with several disastrous and unhappy endings.
He was never prepared for the job of primus inter pares. Many, including some members of his party believe that he allowed arrogance, meanness and corruption to get in the way of good governance. Some in this administration are making the same mistakes. It is said that the former president and some of his colleagues had deep personal insecurities. They thought of themselves as being superior to the people who elected them to serve and not dictate to them.
They also had personal demons which they could not have conquered and this along with their political foibles had paralyzed their governance in that they had a morbid deference for those who disagreed with them or their autocratic rule. As a consequence, the administration became a kakistocracy—a form of government in which the worst people had control and power over the people.
Not only did the former president preside over the worst form of government, but he also made a litany of solemn promises to the people which he did not fulfill. The mandate which the voters gave him was a call to action. It was a signal from the people that the government must earn their trust, ease the burdens and the pressures of poverty, joblessness, and the deteriorating standard of living. Instead, it spent hundreds of millions of the taxpayers’ hard earned money on luxury SUVs and wasted billions on spurious schemes such as the Berbice Bridge, the white elephant Skeldon sugar factor, the Marriott Hotel, the non-starter ICT project and the abandoned Amelia Falls hydro-electric venture. These schemes have led to constant criticism from the public who had accused the last administration of being corrupt and reckless with the taxpayers’ money.
These bungled and botched projects that involved corrupt practices were stoutly defended and embraced by him. Not only did he deny that corruption had existed but he made it quite clear that unless the opposition, the media and the people can prove that someone in his government was corrupt, then they should shut up.
Many believe that the present administration is corrupt but to a lesser extent and is making some mistakes due to their lack of political experience, but the former president should be ashamed to accuse this government of corruption because under his watch, Guyana became the second most corrupt country in the Caribbean, after Haiti.
His selling of the Sanata Complex and the Duke Lodge to his close friends below market value, the awarding of the lucrative drug contract and the giving away of the airwaves to relatives, friends and to his party and the rape and pauperizing of the country are proof of his abysmal performance as president. And lest we forget, the illegal drug trade, high crime rate, rampant corruption, abuse of power and all that went wrong in the country escalated under his tenure.
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