Dear Editor,
For some time now, a larger than life figure has been swaggering around town casting long shadows. He is a swashbuckler, and a mover and shaker overflowing in potency. This dazzling creature is none other but the new Guyana man.
It is better to start out by identifying what he is not. He is not a teacher, or shop girl, or day labourer. No, the new Guyana man is, at times, a politician, an entrepreneur, or a public officer – or some combination thereof. He towers above contemporaries in off-road vehicles, in-house electronic security circuitry, and out-of-the world Midas touch. Everything touched turns into US dollars, and failure is unknown. In fact, success for the new Guyana man is instantaneous, like Minerva springing full born from the head of Zeus.
He strides around surrounded by a platoon of robust chaps; bodyguards, they are called. Spouses flash stacks of cash that would stall Land Rovers if used as speed bumps.
This new tribe of Guyanese has invaded the once exclusive hoods, and placed offspring in private schools where they converse on hundred thousand dollar cell phones, and carry around lunch money in similar amounts. To complete the picture, the man worshipping in the pew across the way is one of them, for he has discovered it profitable to come to God. Perhaps, it is the other way around.
This is a snapshot of the new Guyana man. He is slick, he is sleek, and is a piercing vibrato of chutney, hip-hop, and soca; no Bird or ‘Trane’ for this cat. See him as a combination of mandarin, thug, snake-oil salesman, and horse thief. He is man for any malignant season for he can organize a mob, quell one, and, should circumstances require, annihilate another.
He covers up insider action, and amputates repeatedly the enfeebled arm of the law. Above all, he is rich: stinking, filthy, obscenely rich. There is only one issue – no one knows how he came by his riches; he has no history, no track record of effort or achievement. Prince Alaweed would be impressed, even envious.
To protect his wealth, the new Guyana man has trusted friends named Colt, Glock, Smith (and Wesson), and Kalashnikov. Advisers include mobbed up ambulance chasers and compromised bean counters; and parolees, deportees, and refugees. He is sometimes unschooled, but self taught in the persuasive powers of corruption, intimidation, and eradication.
This new type of man is part of a mutual appreciation partnership: he buys politicians (new men, themselves), who then turn around and sell the former to the public as representative of investment interest and progress.
This irrepressible new Guyana man comes in several forms. He is a distributor (jobs, climate control, propaganda, bonhomie); trafficker (cash, product, people, petroleum); pusher (documents, approvals, penalties, charges). One could easily add planters, shippers and diggers to the catalogue of covers embraced for nefarious designs.
It is hard for lowly citizens to miss the members of this proliferating clan: some wear pinstripes, striped ties, and striped sleeves. On occasion, the unlucky get to wear striped uniforms in faraway places. This, then, is a composite of the new Guyana man starring in a distinctly Guyanese story. It is true that he not without a certain dubious domestic standing; it is equally true that he is utterly without character or class or principles.
Yours faithfully,
GHK Lall
