If there is any expression in the government’s lexicon which best captures the concept of mañana, it is the word ‘soon’. There was Minister of Foreign Affairs Hugh Todd last January telling Sunday Stabroekthat President Irfaan Ali would “soon” name the Ambassador to Brazil, and that the nation should not worry about the issue as it was being actively addressed. We are now in April, and nothing further has been heard about it, even although Brasilia played a critical role in relation to Venezuela’s territorial avarice and was the moving force behind Argyle.
As we reported last month in addition to Brazil, Guyana has no ambassador/high commissioner in India, Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, South Africa, Brussels, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates or Suriname. It is true the crisis with Venezuela did concentrate minds wonderfully, resulting in President Ali finally appointing Dr Richard Van West-Charles to Caracas; that post had been vacant for a considerable space of time. In addition, this newspaper gleaned from three sources that CEO of Guysuco, Sasenarine Singh, was tipped to become this country’s ambassador to Brussels. While Mr Todd did not name him, he did tell Stabroek News that Guyana had requested agrément for an appointee to the Brussels embassy.
Not only has that post too been vacant for an extended period, but the lack of an ambassador there has also meant that there has been no representation from this country at meetings of the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States. This was created under an agreement signed in Georgetown in 1975, and Guyana went on to lead it on a shared platform with the European Union.
Elaborating on current dispositions, the Foreign Minister explained that a senior foreign service officer serves as Consul General in Trinidad, but moves were being made for a substantive appointment. As for Russia, the UK representative was responsible for that country, he said. This arrangement at least is eminently defensible, since the days when we were close to Moscow are long gone, and nowadays Russia is firmly behind Venezuela. As far as the other missions are concerned, Mr Todd said his ministry was working to ensure vacant posts were filled and substantive appointments made where necessary.
Which posts were deemed ‘necessary’ in terms of appointments and which not, was not made clear, but in any case, the responsibility for choosing ambassadors lies in the President’s hands alone, not the Foreign Ministry’s. While theoretically the head of state should take advice from Takuba Lodge it is far more likely that any guidance he is given comes from a more political direction.
The PPP has always had problems with appointments to its missions arising from its distorted notion of what the foreign service is all about, while President Ali has added his personal variation to this in the form of the conviction that he can conduct diplomacy all on his own. In the earliest days of PPP rule, the aim was to reduce the amount of money expended on the Foreign Ministry which it was thought in any case just operated to justify the PNC regime internationally, and allow foreign service officers to attend endless receptions. The skills and institutional memory residing within that ministry, particularly as it related to border issues, were simply not regarded as important.
This was at a time, of course, when the government believed that the Venezuelan claim would melt away because it had lost its raison d’être. It had had its origins in the Cold War which was now over, it was thought, and political justice, so to speak, had at last been realised. Along with the purge of staff at the time went the idea that the main function of missions was economic diplomacy, although the kind of structures which would have been necessary both at home for the successful prosecution of this, as well as in the missions, never really materialised.
Coupled with the view that their embassies, except in one or two cases, did not really serve any particular purpose went the idea that senior postings could be used as a reward for loyalty or favours, or else as compensation when the party was forced to remove a loyalist from his position. The two most egregious examples of this relate to India, when first Ronald Gajraj was forced to resign from his post as Minister of Home Affairs and was appointed High Commissioner to New Delhi as recompense, and then Mr Charandass Persaud, who was given the same appointment presumably for bringing down the coalition government with his vote in December 2018. He proved a particularly unsuitable choice.
There is also former Prime Minister Sam Hinds, who certainly is not going to cause the level of embarrassment associated with Mr Persaud, but has no particular diplomatic experience either, and is being rewarded for his years of service to the PPP/C government. Presumably the delay in the filling of other posts relates to finding, or waiting for, loyalists who might need requiting.
That critical mission posts like those in Brazil, Suriname and India are left vacant is a serious indictment of the government at a time when it can no longer claim to be in a state of penury.
But as said earlier it seems that the President has persuaded himself that all important diplomatic overtures can be undertaken by him personally. After being assailed by the opposition about his foreign policy agenda last June, a clearly annoyed President Ali said that it was active, and that various programmes had emerged from his relationships with over 60 world leaders. He adverted to major global investors who were talking to this country on hydropower, agro-chemicals, a fertilizer plant and a cement plant. “This is the type of work we’re doing,” he was quoted as saying, “positioning Guyana.”
The problem is that all the detailed work which would bring such projects to fruition will not be undertaken at his level, and the local contacts outside investors would need to make would normally be facilitated through an embassy. Furthermore, any number of cement or fertilizer plants and hydropower or agro-chemical projects will not help us with the Venezuela situation. That problem descended at the end of last year with no senior diplomats in place in critical missions, and none of our embassies in a position to have a comprehensive grasp of what the issues are and what the Geneva Agreement actually says, for example. It is not even as if citizens here were given the impression that the government itself was seized of the history of the matter, as well as this country’s rights in that context.
It is not just that our embassies and high commissions need heads, it is also that those missions themselves must have the requisite staff and be in an acceptable physical state to function at their best. One wonders how conscientious the government has been about maintaining their missions if they can’t even be bothered to appoint ambassadors. Embassies present the nation’s face to the world, and if they look shabby, so will their overtures to their host country as well as foreign investors.
They are not, of course, only for show; they have a function, and at the moment that primary function – although not the only one ‒ is to ensure that the governments of the nations in which they are based are fully informed about Venezuela in relation to Guyana. For this they first need to be informed by Takuba Lodge about the issues involved, and kept up to date about developments.
“These things [foreign policy gains] don’t come by accident. These things come by strong work,” said the President last year. He was referring to himself, but the comment also applies to ambassadors and embassy staff, who should have been selected on the grounds of their capabilities. However, going on the basis of ambassadorial appointments, one cannot be too optimistic on that score. Whatever the case it is still true that the President alone cannot make ‘gains’ in the diplomatic arena, especially where border matters are concerned.
After what was said about ambassadorial matters in January, we come to mid-March, where the Foreign Minister was quoted as saying, “the President is still deliberating on the list before him for Brazil, India … An announcement will be made in the coming weeks.” We are now barrelling towards mid-April, so how many weeks will it take? Perhaps the President should drop the word ‘soon’ from his inherited vocabulary, and try the word ‘immediately’ instead.
