Latest update September 20th, 2026 10:40 AM
Sacred trust, latest presidential fairytale
Hard Truths by GHK Lall
(Kaieteur News) – When President Ali talks about “sacred trust”, clearly, he is a leader floating in his own spaceship. Making matters worse, he now believes in his own fairytales. Incredibly, he expects others also to fall for his fables.
REOs reshuffled; some sent packing; and that qualifies as a purge in Guyana. The whole kit and kaboodle in attendance-ministers, permanent secretaries, and tender board officials-and the president puts on a show. “Sacred trust” is inseparably attached to public service. It’s good that unlike Rip Van Winkle (another great lumbering, slumbering performer), who took 20 years to revive, Pres Ali took only six years before he came to life.
In Guyana, talk is cheap. Ali Guyana is better: talk is free. I congratulate His Excellency for thoughtful generosity in his distribution of cheap talk, and free talk. Say whatever rings and echoes, and that’s the sum of leadership effort. Try this abbreviated list from Dr. Ali: transparency and accountability. Misinformation and disinformation. Law and order. Democracy and sanctity. And now, sacred trust. No question, he knows to pick them, coble them together, deliver them, and be forever done with them. Exaggeration? Then, work at this reconciliation.
Transparency: the same Pres. Ali takes a hands-off stance, when the Access to Information office now stands as the equivalent of a Masonic Lodge. Secret signs, handshakes, and passwords are all mandatory before real information becomes accessible. When written over what violates the law, he washes his hands, turns his back, and proceeds to his next fairytale. It doesn’t faze Excellency Ali that transparency is next to non-existent under his watch. But, amid a world of official secrecy, he persists with the myth of transparency. It pains me to have to inform Guyana’s Pres Ali that the presidency is also a “sacred trust” and he has degraded it re-delivering on that call, projecting that standard.
Next, Venezuela hiccups and harrumphs about Guyana’s territory, and Pres. Ali jumps on his well-groomed national sovereignty horse. Guyanese call for renegotiation of the despised Exxon oil contract, and Pres Ali suddenly distances from the sanctity of national sovereignty and patrimony, and prioritizes sanctity of contract. I asserted that, in the president’s scheme of operations, talk is so cheap, it’s free. He goes through appealing phrases, knowing that few Guyanese would call him out, hold him accountable. Transparency, accountability, sovereignty, and democracy grow as he grows. When he shrinks those shrink. When he falters, all his sweetly sung verbal symphonies fall flat, drag him down. A man committed to grand promises, grander speeches. Yet, the daily record is of Guyana’s greatest performer, who is also Guyana’s most pitied. One seen through: hollow and shallow. A leader content to follow when so much falls around him, cries out for presidential intervention, resolution.
Now he is fascinated with “sacred trust.” Sounds good. Feels good. Put it out there. Then retract head, turn turtle. REOs reshuffled in the interest of clean public service. The PPP is so rotted that it must recycle; no new blood. Many shouldn’t have rose so high, nor retreaded, then rotated for another drive. What Pres Ali engages in is mostly greasy pole management. Play at tightening the grip in one spot, lose a step in another. It’s standard in the Ali presidency.
Recall his big production one December with a 5a.m pretended beatdown of tardy contractors before alarmed ministers. Whose name will be called? No worries. Pres Ali is now a seasoned cherry picker. Pick a limb, pick a time, pick a team. He picks himself as mythmaker. What’s one more fairytale? The farces keep on coming. Guyana’s Motown president in action. Hit following hit: transparency, misinformation, and now sacred trust. The president can’t speak to information withheld, nor PPP Govt misinformation (and disinformation) malpractices, but is a fount of information and conviction about “sacred trust.” I see a theater performer, less a president, still less of credible leadership.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper)
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