Birdland, Meadowland, Fantasyland: Pres Ali: Do More

THE 592 GUARDIAN

EDITORIAL · ACCOUNTABILITY & GOVERNANCE

Birdland, Meadowland, Fantasyland: Pres Ali: Do More

OPINION BY: GHK LALL

I have an obligation to serve my president. Dr. Irfaan Ali isn’t the president of a rugby club. Mohamed Irfaan Ali is the President of this Republic. With that comes his own obligations.

Pres Ali must be the clearest, cleanest, and most credible example of transparency and accountability in this country. A model he should be, must be. No ifs. No ands. No buts. Let it be.

Some of his helpers have tried to run interference for him. He who asserts must prove. The asserter furnished the nation with a suitcase of images, numbers, substances. Plus, a wounding, matching narrative. Not so much one that pins Pres Ali on the ropes. But one that diminishes the presidency, the highest, once most honored height in this country.

One bowed before, heralded. If only out of concern for the high office that he holds, the president has to lay bare his numbers, his arrangements; the trail of his accumulations. Adjacent to those must be the underpinnings that hold them aloft. Stated differently, Excellency Ali must present his soul. In all of its pristine cleanliness, odors. And, he should not obscure anything. So that the suspicions and interpretations that flourish do not inflict an injustice on him. He, Irfaan Ali, would set a standard for those 20 Common Entrance youngsters that achieved perfection.

For every number that Azruddin Mohamed laid in public, the people’s parliament, Irfaan Ali should counter with a number that dispels. One fully documented, clearly supporting. For every picture that Mr. Mohamed presented, Mr. Ali should have a picture of his own that confronts and towers above that of his political adversary, once his bosom buddy. For who is better equipped to know and spill secrets than a bosom buddy? When friendship sours, and a bitter public divorce occurs? Mr. Mohamed gave Guyanese full-blown portraits of the president’s extensive, exotic, sophisticated, and delectably luscious farm. Pres Ali cannot limit himself to sketches. Tight sketches as though he is afraid of straying off-script, trapping himself. Pres Ali has to do more. He must. Guyanese are owed. When they are struggling, their president is soaring. When they are hurting, Pres Ali is celebrating his rich holdings. Shouldn’t be. It’s why Mr. Ali must do more. He, his government, his people have demonstrated considerable skills with charts, graphs, timelines, mileposts, and arrival depots. The president has to go to work. Deliver. Not more of what obscures. But of what is openness itself. Speeches have their uses. They have their limits. Nothing can surpass the substances and stories behind those words. The back stories.

One story is that the president is entitled to privacy. As a private citizen, definitely; as the most public office, most definitely not. Is DJ Trump happy to see his business billions broadcast before the world! Pres Ali volunteered and battled for public office. The presidency comes with the gift of a goldfish bowl. He is inside it. Blowing smoke, misting the glass, makes his outline bigger, his shadow longer, his movement shakier.

Citizens watch, come to their own conclusions. Guyanese have read, digested, news of other national leaders in this region, who have been slapped with all manner of charges on demitting office. The goldfish glass case wiped clean. All the rubbish that accumulated inside is dealt with then, with verdicts delivered.

Pres Ali has a history. Untidy it is. Plenty agility manifested. Of saying great things. Then goring himself. Recall: unity, transparency, accountability. Where is transparency when the oxygen of democracy (access to information) is crippled, then cursed, and made into comedy material? Where is unity, when there is a Mocha and IDPADA-G, and disparity in the distribution of the riches from the people’s patrimony? What can be said about accountability, when billions of American dollars are withdrawn from the Oil Fund, and accountability is reduced to the majesty (or malignancy) of three words: national development priorities?

Pres Ali may have truth and righteousness on his side. But his history of presenting inspiring words, then pulling away from backing them up, has now come back to haunt him. He puts up and puts out, or he risks pickling himself in caustic soda.

I advise. Publicize all the acreage owned. From initiation to progression to aggregation. Present all related documents. I’s dotted and t’s crossed. Dots connected. A bright Irfaan Ali narrative emerges. Azruddin Mohamed declines into darkness. His video boomerangs and bludgeons him out of contention. Beyond any hope of recovery.

Just this once, Mr. President: stand. Show hand. Share farm facts. Set the Guyanese people to sit in fair, honest judgment. I advise. Pres Ali should consent.