OP:ED – Where is their character now, whither conscience?

Feb 22, 2023 Features / Columnists, News, The GHK Lall Column

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By GHK Lall

Kaieteur News – Citizens in this country provide enlightenment daily on what matters the most to them, who they really are at their cores. At best, what I observe speak to inconsistency; at its worse, it is about the subtle racial alignments that justify any development, so as to protect one’s own. In sum, individual decay prevails, through the rankest hypocrisies, in those pretending to be about truth, justice, fairness, balance and what is right.

During the long, ugly, dreadful 2020 elections season, which is still not over, all kinds of people helped Guyana. They came from all over, and spoke with strength and conviction about what was destroying Guyana. A fair number of those who spoke were hailed and spoken of in glowing terms for being about fairness and democracy’s norms. It would be improper on my part not to point out that some of those who objected in the sharpest, sternest terms to what the PNC (aka Coalition Government) was trying to pull off during the elections torments are of a strain identical to that of top ones in the then Government.  Moreover, their own political base is primarily like that of the PNC/coalition.

Yet they disagreed.  Still, they objected. Never did they fade or flag from standing for what was interpreted to be right.  Among those hailed as heroes were: Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

He could have played skillful games with words, or adopted postures that gave him room to manoeuver, but he didn’t.  Guyanese of a particular segment in this nation’s demographic were profuse in their precious thanksgivings.  I think that those were in order, certainly due.

But look at what we have today, with no voice of anger, not even some passing disgust for the record, at the studied discourtesy, even palpable disrespect, when the same Prime Minister, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves is disregarded and degraded in our own home, at our main international airport. I would like to ask what kind of people we are, but I already know. Nothing better is expected, nothing better can be, when consideration is given to what has happened to our guardians and luminaries and stalwarts since August 2020.

Deceptions multiply, but so-called learned and honourable men either rationalise or disappear into the mists. I could give them learned, but of honour, not anymore, for it is what they may have never had in the first place. What those who made a world of noise about in 2020 projected a lot of passions over during that same 19-month interval, boils down to this- the tribe- subtle racial instincts and now, blatantly, obvious deficits of character and conscience, because it impacts their clan and comrades and cashbook.

Because to utter a word of disapproval (concern only, not protest) against the indignity that was inflicted on PM Gonsalves and his diplomatic traveling companions could be just possibly construed as being anti-business, hence anti-Exxon, therefore anti-PPP, when all is kneaded and threaded through. This is the putrid state to which freedom and fairness and democracy’s dogged struggles have descended. Those who were loud and proud over the St Vincentian Prime Minister in 2020, are now so consumed by a startling cravenness of character, and its accompanying cockroach-infested conscience that there is a determined rush to distance from the public humiliation of our guest, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, with his sterling handiworks of yesteryear now all forgotten.

It would be a mistake to say that the silent and impotent are nothing but fair-weather friends. It is worse than that in that men (and women) are so beholden to the ties of the tribe-blood, politics, interests, and so on-that there are no other considerations.  That is, no one else, no other group, nothing else counts for anything. They justify anything and everything. These are the remarkable citizens, the unequalled examples of bravery and so-called standing and integrity, who insist that they have Guyana’s back. All of it in its widest most vulnerable, expanses.  The only back that they have is their own, their ambitions, their closeness to power and how much money that makes possible.

It is amazing that these brothers of mine can look at themselves in the mirror, and walk away unaffected. When we can’t stand for a man who was there with us in the trenches of turmoil and trauma, then what can we ever stand for, ever claim to represent?  Even in the most innocent of circumstances-error, incompetence, sloppiness-which does not appear to be so, I expected some good guardian of Guyana’s home, Guyana’s democracy, and the dignity of our prime ministerial visitor, to have possessed the simple decency to find his or her energy and vitality to speak a word of consternation, maybe somecondemnation. It was the embarrassing experience of Prime Minister, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport.  If we can’t do this, then we can’t be about anything.

(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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• conscience, GHK Lall, Government, Guyana, PNC/coalition

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