OPINION: Change will only occur when we first change

Last Updated on Tuesday, 16 September 2025, 22:59 by Writer

By GHK Lall

Guyana is a bitter, unyielding place. A veteran PNC stalwart departs, and the party kicks him on his way out. President Ali unveils his new cabinet, and the hatchet comes out. Chopped to pieces. Local politics is like domestic violence in extremis. I regret presenting these thoughts. But if I can’t be brutally honest with myself, then there wouldn’t be much straightforwardness with my fellow citizens.

The most I would say right now is that Pres. Ali had to know the history of some of his choices, many of the old and new. He decided. Guyanese now have names to denigrate, engage in their version of blood sport. Grisly it is. The reactions range from who was a stalker to who is a scoundrel to who is incorrigible due to treachery personified. The president assured all Guyanese that things have to change, many things. Perhaps, this is his way of bringing about the changes that are circling in his head. The man won, however he won, and to the victor belongs the right of recycling and regurgitating, rolling around and rehabilitating, and taking the raw and converting it to what is righteous. Just a slight point of difference needs to be inserted here. The president’s idea, standard, of what is righteous may diverge from my own, that of numerous others. In a democracy, what is righteous for one leader fuels the luxury of the definition of what is roguery from many observers. The president must have a free hand, and Guyanese will have more than a few opportunities to see what the new band delivers.

From my perspective, President Ali has promised that his second term will be radically different from his first. I say that the leader is due the leeway to prove whether his team is a deliverer or nonperformer. I go further by turning back the pages of history by thousands of years and digging deep into the pages of the Holy Bible. From sacred scripture, some names have singular standing. I give a random snapshot. There was Jacob, King David, Rahab, and Saul who became the Apostle Paul, a Christian firebrand, if there ever was one. Jacob was a conman who, with the help of his mama, cheated his elder brother of his inheritance. But he is named in the illustrious triumvirate of patriarchs called Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (the latter is the former hustler and trickster). David’s name comes up on most occasions that the name Jesus is mentioned (Son of David). David was an adulterer, and a murderer. He not only slept with his neighbor’s wife but arranged for Bathsheba’s husband to be in the thick of battle, so that he was guaranteed to be killed. Uriah was. Rahab was a prostitute, yet her name is right there in the genealogy of Jesus. Last, there was Saul the persecutor, who approved of the stoning of the first Christian martyr, Stephen, from which Boxing Day is derived. And who is the most prolific author and tireless worker for the early Christian Church? St Paul. From sinner to sainthood. See, there’s hope for even a barbarian and ‘undesirable’ like me. Only Pres. Ali would know if he has correction and redemption in mind with his cabinet choices, seasoned and what causes so much sourness across Guyana. The clock ticks, the bell tolls.

It tolled for PNC old-timer, Mr. Mervyn Williams, who called it a day and went his way from the party of his youth, maybe before. I saw a clip of his resignation message. A study in courtesy. Humility. Sincerity. I applaud the man about what was well done, and without a trace of anger or acrimony. It is the way it should be. And how did the PNC hierarchy react? It chopped out Mr. Williams’ departure announcement before his plane had even taken off. Like I said above, there is lot of rancor running around in this country. The vehemence, vindictiveness, and viciousness run long and they run deep. What message is sent to the young in this town, and all the other forlorn, quaint, remote towns in this country? Rather than respect, there is rage. Rather than being reconciled to piercing developments, there is this blast furnace of the retaliatory and recriminatory that reduce target and originator to less than they are. How do we talk to, cool down, reason, with an enraged domestic abuser, when we ourselves are so savaged by the toxins that devour internal organs and surrounding tissues? Not too inspiring or credible, I would attest.

It’s a strange juxtaposition: presidential choices and opposition retribution. If Guyana is ever going to be better, it is both what we say and what we do that will count. And how those are gone about, too. I, too, depart.