OP:ED – Fires too many, too often

Feb 16, 2023 Features / Columnists, News, The GHK Lall Column

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By GHK Lall

Kaieteur News – I am taking stock of these suspicious fires, some of which have been conclusively identified as the work of arsonists. Taken together, I ask myself if there is an undeclared war going on in Guyana. An ‘unowned’, untraced, and seemingly unauthored string of fires coming almost on the heels of each other pushed me to this place about whether some form of peacetime war is raging beneath the surface, but one of an unprecedented kind.

Meaning, that they have no author. Everybody, other than the usual fanatics, have walked on eggshells, and diligently avoided using the dreaded ‘p’ word.  It is neither piety or purity, nor does it have anything to do with what may be considered patriotic.  Then again, one man’s patriot is another man’s partisan.

Regardless of who is who, who is suspected to be behind them, there are these fires, with the Parika Market being the latest, with a shower of welding spark the confirmed culprit.  In a bad situation that is a relief.  Still, I would assert that we have had one fire too many in such a tight window of time.  Tire fires, vehicular fires, street fires, police fires, and school fires head up a growing list.  What I hope is not at work is some clinical selection of ‘soft’ targets.  Perhaps, the objective is more for inflicting psychological damage than physical fall.  I am pondering if there is some element of the random present, though that seems unlikely.  One man had a reportedly bad day (Brickdam), St. George’s was electrical, but others left a sandpaper feel.

What is unprecedented is that there is no supporting combustible rhetoric in local quarters. More genteel conflicts (I chucked war) are preferred these days.  It goes with the times and territory, given that there are these sensitive foreigners in town, a new order.  It simply would not do to have them as bystanders to street mayhem and mob madness, regardless of who is planner and conductor.  The resulting publicity would be bad for business in this time of gushers, four-flushers, and moneychangers.

I am not inclined towards the existence of any proxy conflict in motion currently. If so, it is a low intensity one lacking any accompanying incitements from the usual sources.  There is concern over stealth operations designed to make others look bad. On the other hand, adversaries could be trying to throw some sand in the gas tank, if only to slow things down, to ensure that nobody gets taken for granted, claims of weaknesses and all.  My biggest concern is about whether these fires are rogue operators taking things in their own hands, and flexing muscles that have been dismissed as flabby due to lack of a vibrant head.

If these fires, suspicious by any standards, do not have a head that is even more alarming.  For then there is no identity, responsibility, accountability.  Speculation is not proof, nor is history of any value in identifying the formless, faceless, shadowless. That is, there are too many unknowns roaming around at will, and too much lack of control through no reporting into a central channel.  Such things are dangerous, and can take on a life of their own.  This is what happens when men get restless, through a combination of impatience, uncertainty, mounting frustration, and disgust. The absence of a linking thread provides even more grounds for concern.  Who is in charge?  What else is being compartmentalized?  And what is the likelihood of all these ‘small fires’ mushrooming into a calculated larger conflagration?  In essence, where does all of this end?  I have no answers, except those that I am keeping to myself for the time being.  Currently, the damage inflicted has been limited to infrastructure.  Nevertheless, there is a psychological impact, for one never knows when matters could go beyond property ruin, and there is that new phase of what I shall call escalation.

Now, I am not dismissing anything (or anyone) relative to these fires being the random antics of clueless arsonists.  The fiddling and fudging of the emperor Nero were not aimless. What and where next?  I persist in laying things out in this nuanced manner settled for today.  The physical properties of oil make it a most incendiary of commodities, with proven volatility.  Further, the emotional ones flaring from it can be high octane fuel.  I urge others to check history to satisfy themselves, soothe their misgivings.  Those who are nearest to oil, vested in it, have much to worry about, since such are the burdens that come with ownership.  On the other hand, those who have nothing to lose, or have been condemned to the lot of serial losers, conclude that it is better to push the envelope than let the world go by.  Oil fires such visions, passions, and actions.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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• electrical, GHK Lall, Guyana, Parika Market, St. George’s

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