OPINION: Guyana builds capacity (for other places)

Last Updated on Friday, 3 April 2026, 12:50 by Writer

By GHK Lall

It is said that nobody can keep a good man down. Yonette Cummings-Edwards just proved that that applies to a good woman, as well. The word making the rounds is that former Guyana chancellor of the judiciary (ag), Yonette Cummings-Edwards has been appointed Chief Justice of the Turks and Caicos Islands. From a long-hanging acting capacity at the helm of Guyana’s judiciary to the top of the judicial food chain in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Due to nefarious circumstances, largely political in content, Ms. Cummings-Edwards was cast out in her own land. Now she ventures as an alien into a foreign land. One that is obviously more conscious of her gifts, has a clearer idea of her past and potential wisdoms, and how to make the best use of both.

Pres. Ali may put on his actor hat and say congratulations (or, behind his cupped fist, good riddance). I say, respectfully, of course, that there is a smell coming from somewhere in the vicinity of where Guyana’s president stands. What leg does he and the PPP Govt have to stand on, when there are developments of this revealing nature? I assert that it’s embarrassing also. Forever is the lament about how much Guyana is lacking in capacity. Yet whenever there is opportunity to nurture and retain the scarce capacity in hand, haste to be rid of them has been the norm. Recall a Guyanese born Oil Fellow by the name of Dr. Vincent Adams. Senior public servants have been sent packing for no reason, other than leadership and ruling party fears about their politics. Guyana has been the loser mostly. Now ponder on the move in Guyana that vanquished former acting chancellor, Ms. Cummings-Edwards and paved the way for her banishment into the arms of the judiciary of another country. This has been the tragic story of this country for more than 60 years, from judges to janitors expelled, forced to start anew elsewhere. How can capacity be built and sustained, when its fragile foundations are torn apart deliberately, repeatedly, contrarily?

Thus, what Guyanese get as replacements are greenhorns and amateurs, whose priority is to play the game, so that their survival and continuity are assured. What standards then, other than those of craven, scurrilous politicians with controlling hand? Those who have neither time nor patience (perhaps, not the scantiest interest) in principles and honesty in governance. Get any hack, of which there will always be a flood of them available to get sleazy, partisan jobs done, as demanded by leaders and paymasters. Get any adult with the mind of a child (maybe an imbecile) and push him or her into a high office, with one instruction, one value, drilled into their heads: wait for orders. There is a subtitle: remember what is expected, and how that the line must be toed at all costs, by any means, so that desired outcomes occur. Though not written in any job description, it is written on the brain.

Such machinations are dangerous in jobs like air traffic controllers. The program is down to a science, room for error extremely minute, with lethal consequences in the event of failure. In the instance of the judiciary at the final pivotal, decisive levels, grounds can be found, arrive at an adjudication, which leaves some with their mouths open, and the winners with catlike grins that stretch from ear-to-ear. Different interpretations can be made with words, clauses, phrases, even the placement of a comma, sometimes even precedents, and those are then sold as judicial acumen, judicial sagacity, and judicial profoundness. Reality is less kind, rudely cruder: twisting the law to deliver a desired result. Recall Justice Sandil Kissoon and his ruling in that Exxon matter, the one that had that ugly obscenity, where the Government of Guyana (the PPP Govt) joined hands with Exxon to steamroll the Guyanese people. Recall how quickly crass politicians, more beholden to an oil power, than their own citizens. came out to denounce a decision that didn’t go their way.

For sitting on tribunals to weigh charged cases, it wouldn’t do to have the wrong people (independent jurists) aboard. Acting chancellor Cummings-Edwards had to go, with a still secret subterfuge found to discard her. This is how capacity is rebuilt. It is how limited capacity is attacked and torn down. Guyana will get somewhere. I just don’t know where.