OPINION: The hour is darkest before dawn, better must come

Last Updated on Saturday, 16 November 2024, 11:31 by Writer

By GHK Lall

The president was damned if he did, and equally damned if he didn’t. Finesse aside, the long, dark record of the PPP Government with its signature endeavor (infrastructure or public works projects) would denounce anyone associated with it. It is an indication, if not ugly confirmation, of how horrible things are. It could be about timely delivery of work, or the type of quality and value the taxpayers get for their money in the hundreds of billions. It was in this nasty brutish milieu that Guyana’s President Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali found himself entangled, which necessitated that he does something, anything. He did. This is where the troubles began. For the president. For his government. To some extent, for everybody.

Some Guyanese are of the view that President Ali’s last Tuesday morning histrionics came over as being just too rich. Others say that the president was his normal self: hostile, boisterous, creating a ruckus for the sake of having one. in other words, typical Irfaan Ali. Still other Guyanese say that he engaged in one of the PPP Government’s now patented farces. That is, saying something to give the appearance that he is about something. In my words, the latest instance of ‘Because we Care, therefore I dare’ I say that it could be a combination of all those reactions that came from Guyanese in what jarred their Tuesday into life and has now taken on convulsions of its own. But there are other points that I also must put before the public in the frankest but kindest manner.

I have difficulty generating regard for President Ali. Let that be said to his face before everyone. Openly, but respectfully. I regret that, but circumstances compel. The president did more than his part to drag matters to this low state. He, however, must still be given the time and space to go further than the verbal cuffs and kicks that he delivered. I must trust him, whether I like it or not, to follow up with round two, which should be in approx. two months, or the end of January. Whoever has to work through Christmas to get the job done must do so. No boozing, no excuses, no extensions. So, at the end of January, there must be a progress report. What has been closed out, and how? Who still has outstanding works, already long overdue, and why? In fact, there is no room for why, nor should there be any room in the president’s presence for such, I shall say, adult delinquents. I am going on record that although President Ali ranks poorly in my estimation, I am trusting him to make good on what he started so belligerently on Tuesday, November 12th at 05:30hrs. In Wall Street parlance, it is triple witching hour. The president is on the clock, so are those principals summoned, and so is the system run by the PPP machinery. The sharp-eyed should note that I omitted ‘government’ after PPP. Proven party loyalty, the primacy of party linkage, and the value of contributions made to the party in different ways, have all led to the cluster of couplings (think cluster and another word beginning with ‘f’) that prompted last Tuesday’s belated damage control exercise by the president.

I can weigh in caustically about the role of ministers (collaborating), the authority of permanent secretaries (nonexistent), and the standards of engineers (pathetic), but what’s the point this late in the day. President Ali and even more so Vice President Jagdeo have usurped the roles of the first two. Way back, I made the point that when greener than green Guyanese were recruited for permanent secretary positions, they were there to take up space, and they wouldn’t know if Sunday was a month, or December a season. In other words, pushovers were put in positions of authority, which they couldn’t handle and, worse still, were not given the opportunity to function as they should be relative to the demands of their top jobs. They go along gladly and quietly to get along. This was why matters swiftly went from ground level to the president when the fan becomes clogged with the usual debris. The tender system is a political animal. The procurement oversight system is a joke. And no matter how much I think that President Ali was parading some of the wrong people, engaging in a pretense, I am still duty-bound to let him engage in what is being held out as the first step in a self-correction process. We shall see. If the Tuesday meeting was a flash in the pan, then President Ali consigned himself to the inside of it. Despite major misgivings, I believe that he has begun a process where the public works pornographers can slip out of the noose, or hang themselves with it. We shall see about that, too. Last, I wouldn’t be surprised if, after all the presidential thunder and lightning, this turns out to be a passing shower.