No, Pres. Ali, not that way with support

Feb 28, 2025 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

---

 Hard Truths…

By GHK Lall

Kaieteur News- I am caught on the horns of a dilemma, all three of them.  I ask myself if President Ali can be that careless.  I ponder whether President Ali could be in such a deep state of unconsciousness.  I question if President Ali is capable of such arrogance.  I would like to believe that he is neither; and if he is, that some element of one or all three could be publicly manifested as he did at the Annual Guyana Police Officers’ Conference.  If the head of state didn’t know where he can’t go, what is off-limits, then one of his streetwise advisers at the Office of the President should have informed him, not to go and say what he did.  “Support the work of the government beyond 2025.”  Those words were uttered by the president, and though hedged, I take the position that he went too far, that some damage was done.

Though unwritten (to some degree) and unsaid, it is the height of unwisdom for any politician to cross certain lines.  What applies to the government, also applies to the opposition.  The army is one line where the greatest care must be taken that it is neither crossed nor insinuated through political appeals, however nuanced.  At the army gathering, President Ali was a study in the circumspect.  From him to the army gathering, it was that its members must vote their conscience.  Though there is some difficulty with that, it can be allowed to pass, and here is why.  The president was sensitive enough to tread carefully, straddle the line, to wit, vote conscience.  My hang-up has to do with the mention of how to vote before such an audience.  An army assembly cannot and should not be seen as simply another presidential stop, as part of a bigger political campaign.  A political campaign in a political season that, is for all intents and purposes, (and from early appearances) saturated with the edgy, and the beginnings of a broad front of anxiety.  Even to go near to voting and mention such in that context is a little too much to let go without comment.

I think that President Ali was keen enough in his army address to recognize how far he could push the envelope, so he smartly settled for ‘vote conscience.’  Having exhibited that political leadership discipline, something that is becoming a greater and more distant stranger to him) during his army charge, the president threw caution to the winds, and advanced into forbidden territory at the Annual Police Conference 2025.

“Support the work of government beyond 2025” could be considered loaded, and in more than one regard.  It is helpful that President Ali was sharp enough to discern that he was going into a minefield.  But his couched language within two disclaimers did the opposite of what he may have had in mind.  “Support the work of the government….” may appear to give the president wiggle room.  That is, “support the work of the government” is neutral and should not be interpreted any other way.  Meaning, that it is not a naked call to support (vote for) the PPP in the upcoming elections.  My first reactions are as follows.  So, what has the Guyana Police Force (GPF) been doing in the last five years approximately?  Supporting on a can’t help basis?  Supporting in a selective manner, and to such an extent, that the authenticity of such support suffers in the credibility department?  Has the kind of support that President Ali and his government were expecting been deficient and not forthcoming?  And, last, why was what the president uttered thought so highly of, that it could not be left out of his address, whatever the reception anticipated?

In going over these questions, I think that a public reminder and appeal are both now necessary.  What the president said may be thought of by some as timely during an Annual Police Conference.  I beg to disagree.  What was said is untimely in any season, and a complete no-no, not to be done at all, in an elections season, especially before a senior GPF audience.  A season where the GPF could be called upon to stand on the line and deliver in the face of great hostility.  A season where the GPF has many burdens to shoulder, and is not assisted to any degree by what gives off a whiff of the political.  This brings me to Excellency Ali’s second disclaimer, the one having nothing to with partisanship.

“Every member of the Force has a right to vote according to the dictates of their conscience…and that right will be respected.”  I am sorry, Mr. President, but that doesn’t cut it.  By itself, that is a meaningless and laughable political commercial.  I think that the president realized that he had overstepped, and believed that he could paper over his awkward excess with protective words.  Words for the sake of the words.  Words that were intended to diminish the weight of “support the work of the government…”  Words that only succeeded in generating additional skepticism about what game he was really playing.

(No, Pres. Ali, not that way with support)

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

---

• hard truths

---