From where I stand: Presidential micromanagement is not a governance strategy

Oct 19, 2025 Features / Columnists, News

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By Janelle A.N. Persaud

(Kaieteur News) – It’s happening again.

Last week, President Irfaan Ali summoned contractors responsible for the East Bank Road expansion to a meeting. While there were no viral videos or no public berating, the symbolism felt familiar. If it all seemed vaguely dreamlike, that’s because we’ve been here before. A different room, different set of contractors, but the same dream or should I say; nightmare.

Last year, the president called a 5:30 a.m. meeting with ministers, permanent secretaries, engineers, and contractors at the State House. He arrived armed with a list of projects running over four months behind schedule. When he called names and contractors weren’t present, he instructed that staff be written up. Engineers were accused of failing to issue commencement orders. The message? He will not tolerate delays. What stood out most to me as an observer was the alarming sense that the president had become the project manager-in-chief for public works.

This recent meeting with East Bank contractors was triggered by flight delays and social media photos of passengers dragging their suitcases to the airport by foot. It echoed the very frustrations I’ve experienced myself. Earlier this year, I missed an international flight despite leaving home several hours in advance. Road congestion, construction zones, and poor coordination between contractors and public services made it nearly impossible to move with certainty. So I understand the frustration. I even understand the urgency that drives the president to intervene.

But I can’t help but ask: Is this what governance has come to?

The Vice President recently said these presidential interventions stem from caring. And he could very well be right. There is no denying that President Ali is a deeply involved leader. He shows up, he engages, and he listens. But his care and concern, even if sincere, does not excuse a governance model that is overly reliant on personality over process. In fact, it is precisely because the president cares that he should insist on systems that don’t require his constant hand.

These meetings may earn applause from a population desperate for action, but presidential micromanagement is not a governance strategy. It’s not scalable, it’s not sustainable, and to my mind, it simply masks deeper failures. What should be ordinary functions of public service; performance monitoring, interagency coordination, contract enforcement, now seem to depend on presidential outrage to work. I know some are inclined to see this as accountability but I’m sorry to say, this a warning sign.

And there is a cost to this model. When a country’s head-of-state becomes the visible enforcer of basic project timelines, it suggests that the institutions responsible are either unwilling or unable to do their jobs. It could reduce some ministers and senior public servants to spectators, strips agencies of autonomy, and undermines the very system it seeks to enforce. We cannot normalise governance by reprimand, where leaders manage optics while systems stay broken.

Yes, in a country of fewer than a million people, the president may have to wear many hats and all this may seem acceptable. But even in small states, structure matters. Institutions must be strong enough to function without being shamed into action. Real accountability is evident in monitoring reports, internal audits, and performance evaluations, not TV where the president scolds public servants in front of the cameras.

The pattern we’re witnessing now is not new. Our political culture has long valorised strongman leadership, where effectiveness is measured by how loudly a leader can call out under performers. But as we cheer, we should ask ourselves: Why are these contractors still allowed to delay projects? Why aren’t there meaningful consequences embedded in the contracting system? Why isn’t our procurement and oversight framework rigorous enough to prevent these delays in the first place?

Penalties must matter. Project valuation, rigid pre-qualification standards, performance bonds, stringent liquidated damages, revocation clauses, and properly applied force majeure provisions should all be doing the work, negating the need for presidential intervention. Without these tools actively enforced, we are left relying on optics over systems.

The new “efficiency” mandate of the Ministry of Public Service is therefore necessary and laudable. It represents an opportunity to re-imagine what accountability and effectiveness look like, not through presidential fury, but through data, policy, and performance systems. This new ministry could set service delivery standards, track contract performance, incentivize competent officers, and possibly take over the burden of enforcement so that the president doesn’t have to. If it succeeds, we might one day look back on these high-profile interventions as relics of a less efficient past.

To be clear, the intent behind the president’s interventions is not in question. I get it. These projects affect real lives; missed flights, delayed business, lost time. But the solution can’t be that the country’s most powerful man has to wake up at dawn or hold emergency meetings just to keep things on track.

From here I stand, this is an indictment of the system and it’s time we fix it.

(Janelle A.N. Persaud is a journalist and communications strategist with over two decades of experience across media, public affairs, and development. She holds a Bachelor of Science in International Relations and a Master of Science in Strategic Development Studies from the University of Guyana.)

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• Janelle Persaud, micromanagement, Presidential, Presidential micromanagement

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