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Vice President’s travails

Feb 13, 2022 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

By GHK Lall

Kaieteur News – I feel for the Vice President (VP), really do. Now he knows what possible slander, libel is like. Only he knows about the wrongness or rightness of the bribery allegation hurled at him. It disturbs no end that such a devastating development should surround any leader and none more so than this Guyanese leader, at this sensitive time. People under his watch, close to him, have executed the injurious against his perceived enemies, only to be forced to skulk away in cowardly retreat. The VP has no such luxury because the axes he handed out have been grinded down, and now return to chip away at him, knock him off his blocks.
He doesn’t have much going for him in this alleged sordid affair, those usually done undercover and in darkness. Disturbingly, these have been some characteristics of the VP’s governing style and business mannerisms. He has been called out, only for him to curse out critics. Genuine critics (not farcical and imported comical ones). I am troubled by what he puts on the table in his defense. They don’t further his cause. They diminish them. He is already Guyana’s oil lord, finance ($2000 note) lord, and lord of its political ring. It is how he thrills to making rings around the people. At least, he believes that he succeeds in doing so. Now we find out that he is another kind of lord, a landlord of all things.
A former President, a current Vice President, is a landlord (many times over I understand). I thought that public service and political office were charity occupations, meaning, they don’t pay and the office holders barely make ends meet. Then I remember that interest rates and mortgage rates are favourable. Perhaps, property ownership came about through cash on the barrel, and no questions asked or answered, which is another fine kettle of fish. Meaning, to croon after the Merrymen of Barbados, ‘tell me weh yuh get dat money from…’ Of course, there is always generous help from foreign relations, or fabulous inheritance.
Regarding the former (foreign relations), they are not necessarily biological, which brings the Chinese back into play, with developments that will not die, no matter how hard the VP tries. He said that his assets and income reconcile. I am surprised, even disturbed. Because this supposedly stupendously bright man cannot be making his defense on that premise, which no longer has much recognition in today’s world. Sophisticated people are too slick to make that mistake. They are wiser to the ways of sleuths and scrutineers, and become more skilled at concealing ill-gotten gains. Family surrogates are the vehicles of choice to launder and layer (compartmentalise) rich pickings, and there are always those offshore havens. My recommendation to the VP is he must do better. Assets and income matching is old hat, since nobody with any sense goes that route anymore. Too revealing (like landlordism).
As to that one about Guyana is tiny, has to be friendly with all countries, and careful not to be caught up in some new and developing Cold War climate, the VP clearly has now lost his marbles. He is nervous and his words betray him, undermine the sum of his prior commitments. Guyana engaged the Chinese here in years past when he ruled the roost, so they were a settled corporate presence. Then, along came the elections of 2020, with his greatest mentor, protector, and power of a helper being not the Chinese, but the Americans. Whether the VP agrees or not, it is beside the point, for he already accepted American gifts, so he had to be irreversibly attached to their side, and their way of seeing things.
The Americans see too many new Chinese operations here, which means less American presences, which cannot stand. The VP is smart enough to know that he is a Cold War prisoner today, and by his own hands. Take gifts from godfathers (Don Corleone) and it is eternal indebtedness. The VP must start over. Stop digging deeper holes for himself with these paltry defenses, all which only disturb. And that is even if he didn’t take a cent. He is trying too hard, which exposes him more.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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