The Bully Pulpit

Nov 18, 2024 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

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…Hard Truths 

By GHK Lall 

Kaieteur News-Mention the term Bully Pulpit and American Rough Rider, Teddy Roosevelt’s name flashes across the mind.  Wrong the first time.  For those Guyanese who are fascinated by the Bully Pulpit sound and persist in searching for it in America, Donald Trump is sure to surface in their consideration.  Two strikes have been earned.  The Bully Pulpit is right here in Guyana, and it goes by the name of the Ali-Jagdeo Jazz Combo.

Though it is only a two-man combo, it is so loud that it is a full-scale orchestra.  No Guyanese needs any college degree to discern the Ali-Jagdeo Bully Pit in action.  Or a hearing aid to see them for who they are.  Both use their powerful offices to beat dissenting Guyanese into a pulp.  Laid out flat on their backs in a straight line, is how they find themselves, thanks to the tag team of Dr. Dread and Dr. No.  The fancy Romans used to display skulls on pikes along the roadside, so that others get the message and keep their hands to themselves.  Here Guyanese are steamrollered into sausages.

Dare to ask Dr. Jagdeo a little question about his management of the nation’s oil wealth, and there is a certain inevitability to his answer.  It is a big, fat NO!  Answered that already.  Exxon has schooled him well.  The less he says, the less he gives away.  Dealing at arm’s length with Dr. Dread (Dr. Ali) is like putting one’s bleeding fingers in the mouth of a piranha.  Some folks are squeamish, so I leave out the exciting parts.  The president has earned a dubious reputation for being a growler, a lunger, and a headbutt(er).  The brave in Guyana are free to try.  Me!  I am not messing with those two guys.  Life is too precious and citizenship too sacred for me to be a hero.

Lest I forget, the Bully Pulpit for both President Ali and Vice President Jagdeo is what they call press conferences without cracking a smile.  It is their idea of political humour.  The fact that the two of them could have the audacity to call what they star in (as bouncers and like those old time Texas badmen) press conferences is confirmation that Guyana is, indeed, a democracy.  Some bullies get away with the occasional murder, these two Guyanese political superheroes use their respective Bully Pulpits to get away with verbal bullrushes, large-scale mayhem.  I offer a few morsels of proof.  When was the last time that either Dr. Ali or Dr. Jagdeo held a press conference without it deteriorating into a mudwrestling affair?

It is now part of Guyanese colour and culture to analyze the press conferences of these two political superstars over their rum and water.  Straight, no chaser.  Why water?  Because things are so bad with the richest people in the world (take a backseat Dr. Ganpat) that few of them can afford a Coca-Cola.  How is that for a regional statistic, professor?  Straight from the mouths of the suffering people and surging through and through with bitter reality.  This is what results from giving up communism for capitalism.  When Karl Marx went out from the PPP, Sigmund Freud came in and took over.

Carry on a conversation like that with the Ali-Jagdeo Jazz Combo and the canes come out to beat some sense into the heads of naysaying Guyanese.  It is either dance to their tune or dance on a short string dangling from a tall limb.  Bully Pulpits are shown to their best advantage when there is a surrounding cast of likeminded knee cappers and jawbone crackers.  Ask about corruption and one man says where is it, when 95% of the business is cleaner than the insides of a brand-new vacuum cleaner.  I did my on ruff (Lazy Boy) computation, and came up with the astonishing.  Five percent of GY$558 billion budgeted for infrastructure is still GY$27.9 billion that went astray.  It may not have the class of Dr. Ramesh Ganpat’s singular skills, but it works for me.  More to the point, it may not be big money for President Ali or VP Jagdeo, but it is real money for a peasant like me.  And a million other Guyanese panting for their dollop of the oil riches.

When bad dealing with the people’s money is the issue one man weaves his usual post luncheon press conference (bully pulpit) artistries.  Meanwhile, the other half of the Ali-Jagdeo Jazz and Jive Combo calls a prebreakfast gathering to get his vocal cords going.  Like American General Douglas MacArthur, he ensures that the entire national press corps is in attendance to record his utterances for posterity.  When Excellency Ali jumped on his high horse and galloped onto his Bully Pulpit (with his captive and cowed audience) I get flashbacks from Mario Puzo’s Godfather.  He made an offer that couldn’t be refused.  The press fell in line and out-of-line Guyanese embraced their ultimatum: put up or shove off.  Sounds to me like the kind of language that the boisterous would be at home employing.  Whether Bully Pulpit, thundering drama, or empty bravado, it’s all the same to me.  Been there, seen that; all heard before.

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

(The Bully Pulpit)

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• Ali-Jagdeo Bully Pit, American Rough Rider, Dr. Jagdeo, hard truths, Teddy Roosevelt’

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