Media truths and the VP

Oct 11, 2024 Editorial

Editorial…

Kaieteur News – Though he may be different as a man, as a politician, Vice President Jagdeo has a plantation mentality. He doesn’t like anyone who is independent, doesn’t react well to anything that is about freedom. For Jagdeo, this fetish about media freedom and truths has reduced him to a crippling condition, a snarling, spitting version of himself. Since when, Mr. Vice President is media freedom and truths, as revealed by independent entities rise to the level of a vice? The vicious reactions of Jagdeo are baffling, especially when media disclosures squish him into a sputtering, raving figure weekly.

Guyanese have no confidence in the work of State media. Too many hacks, too much huckstering to the PPP/C Government’s line, with so-called media professionals looking like circus performers. Guyanese also know that private media friendly to the PPP/C Government, and beholden to total leaders like Jagdeo, appreciate who shares out the gravy, and whose mere word could squeeze their existence. The new reports, therefore, that emerge from those sources are quickly dismissed as tainted and not worth the time or effort to absorb. Only the small, tough cluster of independent media houses is left. It could be numbered on the fingers of one hand, with a spare left. This group is what bends the all-powerful chief policymaker Jagdeo into the picture of a man experiencing severe abdominal gripes. He hears the name Kaieteur News, is informed of an inconvenient front-page caption, and his whole face changes. His face becomes distorted with rage, leading to violent outbursts. It is all because he has grown so accustomed to operating in the dark and friendly media allowing him to roam as he pleases. He can rant and roam to his heart’s content, but when it is news time, Guyanese still must be presented with the facts, the truths. They outlast any outraged politician, any craven political group, any government vested in total control and the dominance that ensues.

Citizens have a hunger for truth and clarity presented in the simplest manner. Guyanese may appear to be limited, even gullible to ruling politicians too full of themselves, confident that they can make the skeptical trust them and eat of their hands. It is a fatal error made by many politicians around the world. People know when they are being deceived, sold a pig in a bag. Guyanese have been sold so many of the latter by one government after another that they can open their own pig farms, and supply ExxonMobil and its offshore operating partners with as much pork as they need. Also, in the manner of politicians worldwide, learning comes slowly. So, they persist with their verbal tapdancing and verbal hairsplitting and verbal beating around the bush in the vain hope that the people will not see through them. We thought that a politician of Jagdeo’s lineage and stature (former minister of finance, former head of state, now vice president and chief policymaker, plus chief oil steward and spokesman) would have known better, pushed himself to make the necessary adjustments. But Jagdeo would have none of it, is determined to have his way, even as there are repeated head-on collisions with the independent media. Independent media is devoted to presenting Guyanese with the full truth on their oil wealth, state of their governance, and their prospects for the future.

A politically more astute man than Jagdeo would have let go of his ego (and his darker side) and found ways to coexist with the truth-seeking independent media. But he gives short thrift to what would work. His way emphasizes a marked preference for loudmouthed abuses, cherry-picked pet issues, and set softball questions. So, he steadily dodges his duty to tell this nation the full facts and the whole stories in the areas in which he has given himself total authority. Oil is the biggest thing for Guyanese, but this sector is where Jagdeo has shared little of substance. From all indications, media truths about oil make Jagdeo nervous, media truths amount to an intolerable vice. What is Jagdeo vice president of: oil or covering up for ExxonMobil? He is the best person to answer that question. An accurate answer would be the best response.

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citizens, ExxonMobil, Guyanese, policymaker, Vice President Jagdeo

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