Dear Editor,
Recent circumstances reinforced to me how dysfunctional, deformed, and degraded this hodgepodge called a nation has become. They emphasize the ugly places where so many reside, and the near impossible distances that must be journeyed to get somewhere, anywhere.
First, I read once again, of referring that current burning interpretation and selection controversy to the CCJ. No one wants to acknowledge that this is more than about a sensitive job but, at the palpitating core, a national trust, a sacred one. Reaching to the CCJ, would be in NFL parlance what would be termed a ‘lateral pass’ or a ‘shovel pass’. In more everyday language, it is the equivalent of escaping dangerously building pressures and handing over responsibility by passing the buck to someone else.
As I absorbed that latest call, there was the reminder of that familiar national plague and national disgrace labelled domestic abuse. It is where the constant conflicts, anger, distrust, and low self-respect threaten always to erupt into the unmanageable and destructive in the family quarters; and where there are continual urgent appeals to neighbours to come to the rescue. Many a time, despite the kindliest of intentions, those same neighbours are just too unsettled and disgusted by the frequency of the cries, required intervening and peacemaking efforts, and the uselessness of it all.
Editor, I suggest that that is how this place called Guyana, and its contingent of political leaders appear before neighbours in the region, who might prefer to be uninvolved and at a convenient distance. In sum, local political conflict parallels the individual (domestically abused) family running and clamouring for help, only to discover that the once responsive community is now resigned to the unchanging pattern of self-destructive behaviour, that they want no part of it; and that it is downright embarrassing all around, and lacking in pride and dignity.
Like the domestic abuse and domestic violence in the house, the national political abuse and national political confrontations can and will only be resolved when the principals face each other honestly, thoughtfully, and with the readiness to come to mutual understandings, and make reciprocal adjustments and concessions. This occurs when those same warring family principals come to their senses, and do so in the best interests of the larger family held hostage. To restate the obvious, what is good for the family, has application for the nation. There should be no mistake: no neighbour, no CCJ, no Caricom can do so for this land; it would be temporary only, and until the next roiling issue surfaces. Solutions have to originate from here and within, somehow and sometime. Otherwise, this naked wretched society and its citizens will continue to be the laughing stock and the object of ridicule from one and all.
Yours faithfully,
GHK Lall
