H@rd Truths By GHK Lall – Disappointed in the President

Apr 07, 2023 Features / Columnists, News, The GHK Lall Column

---

Kaieteur News – As Guyana’s President goes, so do most of the rest of Guyanese.  His Excellency, President Dr. Irfaan Ali has a great responsibility placed on his aging head, in his hands now knotted into the tightest fists.  Regrettably, I hear and read of verbal fists of fury from President Ali’s people, and no objection from him.  His Excellency Ali represents the nation’s presidency; he is not Bruce Lee.  Leonora!  Leonora!  Oh, Leonora!

In one’s hometown, in the sacred sheds of one’s homesteads, there is an abiding, expansive hospitality extended to sojourners, seafarers, wanderers, and all those who fall under the umbrella of strangers. I mention this, because of President’s Ali now known and growing affinity for things and people in the lush Middle East, particularly those of the UAE, which holds a special place in his heart; as partnered with, in his calculations, too.  The desert sands of Arabia and Palestine are hallowed ground, and it is territory famed for its hospitality.

Will somebody please do me and our dear President the favour of whispering that to him, so that he can absorb. So, that he may grow with true graciousness.  Of all places, and in all its considerations, Leonora should have been a welcoming ground for all those who came.  All, I repeat, as I include the press.  It is President Ali’s homeland, and even amid the intrusively vulgar (as interpreted), or the crassly unbecoming (again, as monitored and concluded), there ought to have been what honoured the favourite son of the Leonora soil.  Once more, all are extended a warm hand, even to those with their hard questions, their unwanted presences, their discomforting unveiling of what is best left in the shadows of darkness.

Yes, President Ali’s people got excited and a shade carried away, leading to them carrying on at a rate.  Ah, this thing, this ideal, this mystery that is called democracy and its freedoms.  I nervously venture to mention its obligations, while at it.  I hope that is not considered an obscenity.  A great American President, Franklin Roosevelt, once said that “the only thing to fear is fear itself.”  With respect to FDR, there is another fear, and it is a greater fear: it is the fear of truth.  Now that I am on a roll, there is the fear of light, for light is about transparency and fidelity to duty, and responsibility to each citizen in this country, including each held as an adversary.

I trust that I did not offend the President with that little lecture; or his people, either.  Presidents set the standards.  Presidents stand in front and lead forward; it must be always, ever upward.  Presidents are pacesetters and gamechangers and trailblazers.

To my shame and sorrow, His Excellency President Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali did not identify with, nor idealized, nor inspired with any of these absolutely vital leadership attributes.  My president failed me, failed Guyanese, and failed his erring, agitated brethren in Leonora. President Ali had to arrest the aggression (he didn’t).  His Excellency Ali had to calm the rabble (he didn’t; may even be said to condone its excesses).  President Ali had an opulent opportunity to personify how much of a Statesman he is, with a glint in his eye: let them ask their questions, any question about anything (but he didn’t).  Instead of being a Statesman in Leonora, when the occasion demanded so of our beloved President, he was content with the pale beauty of being a showman.

Sitting Presidents do not tacitly energize mobs, no matter how helpful, or protective, their intentions.  When a sitting President Ali stands for such, then he stands on nothing but sawdust and silt, which has its own revealing leadership sponginess, telling slipperiness.  There is no traction, Dr. President.  Indeed, we have oil and by the ballooning billions in this Easter season, this season of unease, this season of inquiry about what is happening with it.  To object to, to try tricks with, and find fault with, questions about oil is tantamount to an archbishop or ayatollah or acharya refusing to share answers about heaven and paradise. Possibly Hades and purgatory, too.

For, oil is now all of those things to Guyanese, especially the ones who don’t know, but want to know a little more.  Oil is heaven and paradise, in its promise.  If President Ali is allowed to have his way, then it becomes an unspoken one; a word not worthy of utterance in his regal presence. Oil is feared also to be of hell and its heat, if handled poorly and uncleanly.  Presidents do not take the Fifth, not even consider doing so. I consider all this, and offer President Ali my humble thoughts.  Not on my watch!  Not in my space!  Not before my face!  Those were what should have been his language and attitude to his own.  Let the questions come.  If not, President Ali comes dangerously close to imitating the Guyana’s Parliamentary Speaker, and all that goes on there.  In all courtesy, President Ali, be the bar.  Lead by example.  Stand tallest.  The only thing to fear is the fear of truth.

(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.)

---

• Disappointed, GHK Lall, His Excellency, presidency, President Dr. Irfaan Ali

---