Dear Editor,
I confess to being torn. The calls have been quick and loud for prioritizing constitutional reform and starting the healing. Those calls have come from foreigners and local voices. Here is where I stand.
I agree that there is the highest urgency for both constitutional reform and racial reconciliation. For right now, I think that the pandemic and economy must be addressed first. Get the pandemic story straight and put arms around it, especially at the points of exposure. It is my position that this pandemic was not given the priority of place, authenticity of action, and the most comprehensive approaches that could have been. It suffered from politics and it took second place to elections. That must change. We need to know where we stand, what we are really doing, and what confidence can be reposed in whatever is being done. Clarity is key, and that I fear was where failure reigned. The government seems to be on the right track on this.
Regarding the economy, citizens not working (pandemic related) exist on a shoestring. I want to hear early how help is forthcoming (which I did, to some extent); there must be more and timely. There must be stability, confidence, and thoughtful movement in this direction. An integral part is a budget. The Hon. Minister of Parliamentary Affairs said last week that movement to parliament could happen in two weeks. I do not second guess anything at this early stage, but I think that two weeks are a tad too long. There is much institutional memory and veteran hands around for a possible narrower time frame.
Now I shift focus to reconciliation; constitutional reform to follow another time.
Reconciliation is needed like nothing else; anyone who thinks otherwise is fooling himself, denying reality. But how to get near reconciliation when the very word prompts snarls and curses? I heard about a Suriname model; I offer the Rwandan one also. Then, there are groups and think-tank (like) entities doing some heavy thinking and lifting/sifting for a way out of the historical, cultural, political, and racial mazes.
For his part, British High Commissioner, Greg Quinn, has been consistent in his early calls and push for both constitutional reform and reconciliation; I applaud him. I envision resources and know-how brought to bear from such sources. Now I stray from the reservation. Any reconciliation possessing depth and durability must originate from national soul-searching and across-the-board Guyanese willingness to stir into life. There must be no surrendering to the indifference of malaise and resignation, on the one hand; or the ecstasy of victory and the arrogance of assent, on the other.
It has been said that political leaders made and drive the racially divisive bus. That holds limited truth. I think that leaders would lose basis and energy if the impulses were either not fostered in the racial ranks; or were not readily generated from within the political tribes, where the cultish flows passionately. It is the people who empower the political principals. It is why I ask this: if so many are concerned with the hatreds, why is there so much gleeful identification with division? Why is there not more abandoning of that which injures so grievously?
Thus, I say that healing is contingent upon meeting of Guyanese minds -it cannot be initiated by, pushed by, maintained by one side or one group. It is not helped by constant reminders of 5 months of fiascoes and the no-confidence interval, nor by still unresolved elections disputes. We are too far apart to think of, talk about, or move in tandem, on anything relative to reconciliation. Too much anger. More bitterness.
Separately, reconciliation is not helped by any unjustified public service bloodletting. It cannot occur without the religious sphere participating, despite the biases and bigotries from worshippers that inundated social media platforms. Also, private sector appointments in the political realm serve to confirm the raging distrusts that were harbored. Last, the media is viewed as lacking objectivity and prejudiced.
It is why I recommend that reconciliation be from the ground up, rather than the other way around; a grassroots solution with the many voices contributing. This must be a Guyanese fix that follows from frank and fearless conversation, examination, and conclusions of where we are, how we got there, and what we have to do to move from today’s Guyana to something possibly higher and better. That is, if we are interested.
We should be ready to let all the accumulated poisons out from where they coalesce into sepsis. Foreign solutions will not help us; in this pervasive family feud, this must, of necessity, be a Guyanese solution. I believe that the ordinary people should be guided (not directed) as to what they truly desire. On those simple visions can be built the mechanisms and layers towards partial reconciliation, which is the best that may come.
The models of other places similarly divided and conflicted could serve as outline to address impasses, distrusts, and hard hatreds. But whatever we come up with must be tailored to the peculiar circumstances of historical, political, and racial Guyana. Only that will give a chance to work. Again, if we are so inclined.
Yours faithfully,
GHK Lall
