National awards for 2022

Dec 12, 2022 Letters

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Dear Editor,

In my capacity as uninvited, unwelcomed, and unpaid advisor to President Ali, I humbly submit the following respectful recommendations for consideration for 2022 national awards.  All are merited.

The President should award himself three medals.  One for transparency, a second for accountability, and a third for unity. The citations should read as follows. Transparency: for unparalleled dedication to storytelling while leaving Guyanese more mystified. On accountability the wording must say: for standards that held the thieving PNC to book, but used another one for friends, family, and favourites. Regarding, unity, the record is impeccable: Guyanese are together like never before; one group goes to the bank (or where cash is stashed), the other runs to the pawnbroker (to barter anything).  What could be more unifying than that picture?  I think that His Excellency has earned all three national awards.

The best slogan of 2022 is ‘One Guyana.’  In a nutshell, never has a nation owed so much to a leader and a party for doing their best to define and decide who counts as this mythical and magical ‘One’ and those who qualify as another ‘One.’  No colour coding, no sugarcoating, no second language interpreting should be required.  One Guyana distills to this: bow down and belong.  Naysayers and critics can make up their own minds; hey, it’s a free country.

For courageous service under harrowing fire, Guyana’s EPA head takes 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd, and every consolation prizes. The President may think of himself as Dr. Teflon; but the head of the EPA is the real McCoy, a nonstick frying pan.  He neither sizzles nor fizzes, despite the denouncements that pour on his hapless head.  When giving him his medal, give him an asbestos suit, and an Apollo 13 one also. The man is like Elliot Ness of FBI lore, nothing touches, nothing fazes.  Can I have that job, and the cash too?

The national award for fiction literature goes to the President’s scriptwriters.  There is creativity, mystery, fantasy, with all the elements present: a superhero (the President), a supervillain (the PNC), and a supergerm (rigged elections).  It is ‘One Guyana’ in diamonds. An award for unequalled hypocrisy belongs to the European and American Foreign Legion resident here. The diplomatic doublespeak calls on the PPP to act against Guyana’s bribe takers and corrupters.  Weren’t these the same people-PPP financiers, PPP guardians, and PPP insiders, [some ministers]-that the foreigners hobnobbed and socialized with a while back?  I can visualise the DPP’s office, SOCU, and the AG fetching that corruption basket.  I have many names that belong.

National encomium belongs to Exxon’s Country Head in Guyana for his miraculous skill of speaking two languages simultaneously.  Like Americans swear, (expletives omitted) foreigners are taking over. The Country Head had a gem for Guyanese: it is the best contract ever, then supporting billboards.  Thanks for half of the story.  The second language still to engage locals is that the same contract is also the best ever for Exxon.  For every revenue dollar that Guyana gets, Exxon gets multiples of that, and of which the headman is mum.  He gives that lovely duty to John Hess, the delirious Exxon proxy.

The best parliamentary manoeuvre is owned lock, stock, barrel, and all those oil boats out there by the now Almighty PPP.  Since the natives are clamouring for transparency and accountability then, in the best democratic tradition, give them a committee, and ensure that it is always short of a quorum, calendar, and clock.  In sum: no meetings, no discussing, no nothing.  I love it; would made Machiavelli. I will let the skeptics and critics in Guyana’s barren mental desert know that we have the best tendering and awarding system anywhere, and for which an international award would be most becoming.  It works like this: put in a bid, make a few phone calls, shake a few hands (have something inside), and wait to hear name called.  Clockwork, it is, just like the Ministry of Social protection, and its Old Age Pension book distribution sleight of hand.  Is this a national government involved, or ghetto gang?  Still, I think that the minister and her bottom-house cabinet should get at least honourable mention for trying, fast one notwithstanding.

Last, Central Government and the Local Government Ministry are deserving of an award for what both are doing to the capital city.  Pumps are given, but fuel is unavailable in a crunch.  The President cleans up, but I am still paying monthly (for years) to clear my drains, and also my garbage bins when the City Council trucks are not running or bypass my home.  These are outstanding examples of ‘Because we Care.’  And, ‘We know you are There.’  A Nobel Prize is due… To me.

Sincerely,
GHK Lall

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