The situation in Guyana

Jul 12, 2020 Letters

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Dear Editor,

As human beings, we all have our beliefs and interpretation of past and current events.
This shapes our attitudes and, in the case of the media, editorial policy and proclivities.
The present situation in Guyana requires all of us to leap beyond these proclivities or if we prefer prejudices for the sake of a secure and viable Guyana.
In view of the above, I can see no difficulty with you publishing this letter, which seeks ultimately to mend and not rend, to heal and not peel, a wounded and unhappily divided nation.
I have earlier pleaded long before the Elections that there is the urgent need for our political leaders to talk and find a Modus Vivendi. It is the only, and I repeat only mechanism to salvage and save Guyana. This need to sit and talk without the media is a matter of grave urgency.
I say urgent, since COVID-19 has exacerbated conditions globally and having an adverse effect on Guyana. Yesterday, the Director General of WHO made an impassion plea for solidarity in dealing with this murderous health pandemic.
In similar vein this need is for good sense and solidarity among our leaders. COVID-19 may subside in the not too distant future, but unless every side of the political divide recognizes that in the present charged environment, neither the Courts nor even GECOM can really help us to settle down and move forward as one people.
We need to sit and talk to each other with civility and sincerity. A prerequisite to talks must be a public affirmation to subscribe to an unchangeable moral code, which we cannot get from any judiciary, internal or external. For much is left in the hands of Judges and those identified to interpret man’s constructed laws. In this regard, we need to leap beyond human moral sense.
We have been reminded, in an Encyclopedia of Philosophy, that “The moral sense is also an influencing motive in our pursuit of virtue and our avoidance of vicious behaviour, and it plays a part in our bestowal of praise and blame.”
The key issue and the real challenge is to find some uniformity which will invest all of our leaders with a sense and passion for morality, where the theology of some folks is “thiefology,” and therefore see nothing wrong with stealing, corruption, the manipulation of institutions and our man-made laws and regulations.
It is now popular for us to lean on the experiences and principles of two countries that have generally influenced Guyanese of every generation. These are USA and UK. Today, we regard them, and rightly so, as great nations and bastions of democracy and justice.
It is their history, prowess and internal conditions that propelled them to greatness. We must not forget that in the UK, for example, they traversed a road where they once beheaded their King and saw the suspension and the restoration of Parliament.
Great Britain controlled a vast empire over which they boasted. The sun never sets.
In the United States we find a few who make simplistic statements about democracy in Guyana. They ignore, for example, that the United States maintains the largest and most powerful military in modern history, which in essence has always supported their interpretation of democracy.
Rightfully, the Americans rose up against King George III, which led to their declaration of Independence in 1776, making a solemn promise for equality and justice for all men. But less than one hundred years later the American Civil War broke out between the north and south.
The issue of enslaved Africans was foremost, yet one hundred years later, black people was still struggling to enjoy the promise or democracy which presupposes a quality of opportunity in every aspect of life and the true meaning of their creed that all men are created equal.
We witnessed the war in Mexico which was anchored upon expanding Anglo-Saxon concept of democracy. Of course, in this region, we had the invasion of Grenada in 1983, which almost split CARICOM in two, all in the name of democracy. Grenada is a tiny island of 110 citizens, less than the number who lives in Georgetown and less than those that congregate in a shopping mall on any day in any European or North American city.
Guyanese must work tirelessly to agree on morals and an uncompromising code of conduct for all persons in position of influence and authority. Political leaders, religious leaders, public officials including teachers and the security forces must be men and women with strength and good character.
Guyana, thanks to our colonial history, is suffocating because of this question of ethnic identification, where from my analysis, perhaps eighty percent of voters are influenced by race. Happily, we have twenty percent population that have risen above considerations of race and religion.
The above is not the result of a scientific analysis but my own conclusion having traversed every part of Guyana for over six decades. Talks must therefore not seek to avoid this real issue.
We have today an interesting situation where to my mind, the CCJ for whatever reason has cast aside our laws and assaulted our sovereignty, commenting on matters suggesting a bias and avoiding what is the crucial issue of the integrity of ballots cast in our 2020 Election. As a lay-person, I find it completely irrelevant, the CCJ’s reference to the December 15, ‘No Confidence” motion.
They side-stepped the circumstances, which led to the ballot recount and what ought to be the consequences of that ballot recount. The Agreement for the Recount was brokered by CARICOM and signed by the representatives of the two principle players of the 2020 Elections, PPP represented by Leader of the Opposition, Bharrat Jagdeo and Leader of the Coalition, David A. Granger.
In life’s journey, you experience many examples of what we term collateral damage but that have always been vagaries of life on earth. I am a simple man and could abide by simple answers. I hope that by the time this letter is published we can see GECOM moving ahead so the nation can settle in to be governed by a President identified as a result of a fair process.
Yours truly,
Hamilton Green

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