The President needs to get his feet on solid ground where the Gecom chairman is concerned
Dear Editor,
Reference is made to the March 21 Demerara Waves story titled, ‘Gecom chairman must not be an activist or associated with any political party Granger.’ My first reaction was: Who? And from where?
To begin with the use of “chairman” banishes a whole set of ladies. That miswording is excused, as I commend the President for the invigorating reach of his standard and vision for this most sensitive, controversial position. I like very much those features of independence, impartiality, and integrity, but I dare to ask again: Who, when the chips are down and the votes are short? That kind of steel is not found on planet Guyana.
Separately, I am certain that objectors will surface to bemoan and excoriate the President for adding to the constitution as he goes along. My position is that constitutions are not silos erected and existing in outer space. Rather, they are flesh and blood documents crafted by (sometimes crafty) men with (usually) traces of nobility and idealism embedded in a surrounding sea of hard-edged, selfserving constructions. As an example, I draw attention to that venerated scripture, the US Constitution, and its coverage of the combustible slave question. The point is that what is intended (or pretended) to be Solomonic could end up more closely related to the diabolic, and with consequences no less hellish.
That aside, and even as I ponder whether Mr Granger has cultivated some detachment from reality, I discern a Machiavellian streak in this near regal pronouncement about nonactivist and non-association. Clearly, he has presented the opposition with a basket to locate water in the desert and then to fetch it to bathe distant, perhaps non-existent, ducks. There is much difficulty in first finding citizens who could possibly meet the leader’s lofty criteria, and who would then deign to be associated with the wellregarded opposition, and its even more highly regarded helm. Men and women of such calibre know better, and demand better of selves, ambitions notwithstanding. As a point of reference, those with long memories should return to the early days of the then ruling party in 1992, at which time there were more than a few who refused to be publicly identified with the government of the day. And this was before it descended to the sorry state that it is in today. Further, it is simply inconceivable that the opposition would know or welcome or trust any independent, impartial individuals reeking of integrity, and especially not where the Gecom chair is concerned. It is neither in its character or political fibre to take such a momentous risk.
Thus, I think that the President is in a bottomless boat rowing towards a vacant horizon on this one. He needs to get his foot on solid ground quickly. Yours faithfully, GHK Lall