Dear Editor,
It was reported that the Minister of Home Affairs had a feeling out process lasting all of the last five years, and that he “intends to get upset” and “intends to kick a—” in the next five years (KN, April 17). At first I wondered whether Guyanese should chuckle or grimace. I did both while placing these comments in the realms of chicken machismo and mental disequilibrium.
Where else but Guyana would it take five plus years to get to, or through, a feeling out process? Surely, there has to be – must be – a printer’s error. Then again, given the man, the party, and the operating environment, why not? But I digress.
The Minister promises to get upset. Whether it is to be generated by gastronomical upheaval caused by the richness of his surroundings, or while reaching for intellectual space and running into a mud wall immediately, is anyone’s guess. But while he struts and preens and blusters (or plans to), the hapless citizens of this country live the reality of being chronically upset, and acutely so, and wanting to do right now what he makes a production of when discussing the future.
In every county and region, citizens are upset and bitter with the police. Be it unanswered precinct phones, police sloth, police incompetence, police shakedowns, police corruption, many are very upset; they simmer with barely contained anger. They have been upset for the accumulated perversities of years, as evidenced in the lawlessness that spans the spectrum of manufactured traffic violations, noise nuisances, routine extortions, vehicular deaths, and other matters representative of felonious conduct. Further, they have been upset about anything and everything in between from foot dragging to payoffs to plain disinterest, regardless of the gravity of the offence. The chorus of laments and allegations has been steady, almost unremitting; usually it is the poor and the weak, the most dependent in society who cannot afford the price of some semblance of justice in the land that this Minister supposedly serves.
They have been particularly upset when this Minister reportedly spoke of a few bad eggs only, of a few rogue cops, and of people trying to tarnish the efforts of the GPF, when the truth is a tsunami of knavery and lawlessness. The Minister has some association with that word. It is this same Minister who busies himself conjuring the pretence of being upset tomorrow. Two days ago he was unmoved by the implications of the more than occasionally stalled carousel between the GPF and DPP, or the comments of the Police Complaints Authority, regarding issues encountered with police stonewalling. If this is not hallucination of a particularly fascinating and egregious kind, then what is?
In the meantime, besieged citizens have cried out for a servant of ethics, a minister to truth, and a proconsul for incorruptibility. Finally, they have been answered; after the eternity of five years of wasted apprenticeship, the student minister now girds himself to be an ‘a— kicker.‘ Citizens are encouraged to be hopeful. But only if he practises that fine art first on himself.
Yours faithfully,
GHK Lall
