Archive for category: GHK Lall

THE 592 Guardian.♦Accountability♦Objectivity ♦Truth                   

The Book of Judges –Revealing, Riveting-July 2026

The Bible is out.  It’s Guyana’s Book of Judges.  What a book, it is.  Like the Bible not referred to, there are good judges and a heap of bad judges.  Life.  Get used to it.  Most of all, there’s a place called Guyana.  Ever heard of it?  Better that didn’t happen.  Spare the senses, help the faculties endure much longer.

Try these.  First example, whoever said a judge has to be faultless, meaning, infallible, needs an immediate head x-ray.  Even Roman Catholic popes are not infallible.  Notwithstanding old pronouncements to the contrary over a century and a half ago.  If not Vicars of Christ, then it’s clear that expectations are too high for Guyanese judges.  What Guyanese may have in mind for local judges fits the mold of England’s Lord Mansfield and Lord Wilberforce.  Or America’s Oliver Wendell Holmes and Charles Evan Hughes.  They don’t make like them anymore.  Like JOF Haynes and Akbar Khan from right here.  Hence, I recommend that my fellow Guyanese come back down to earth.  Settle for Justice Clarence Thomas.  See how quickly this country is returned to the days of slavery (if it already isn’t).  Think a luminous jurist with the prowess of Justice Clarence Thomas would ever rule against American gladiators and New York Stock Exchange darlings, such as Exxon and Chevron.  Think again.

There’s America.  There’s England.  There is Guyana.  Things are a little peculiar here.  This is PPP Guyana.  The lid just collapsed on everything.  Perverse and profane are the fittest, most proper words.  Who cares about charges?  Since when did that matter to the PPP brain trust?  By the way, it’s a one-brain brain trust?  I am open to challenge, any enlightenment.  On both counts.  In a society where favoritism, cronyism, and nepotism are all at rampant levels, it is fascinating that so many Guyanese are still stuck at who’s related to whom.  Or was.  Take it for granted.  Move on.  The PPP has continuously proved that it’s a legacy entity.  Money passed on.  Assets handed down.  From father to son, mother to daughter, those have all been prominent parts of an enduring kith and kin culture.  Count on critical support from me.  It’s what my position on the appointment of judges with conspicuous political lineage.  None can say they don’t know where I stand.

Convictions, relations, connections, all are part of the same closed and intricate PPP spider’s web.  Outsiders are out.  Logically, where else can they be, since out is out?  I am bewildered.  Not blue; at least, not yet.  Guyanese just must manage themselves in a more responsible manner.  Old judges, recent judges, new judges, and temporary judges, what do citizens expect when they study these people?  I hope it’s not the voice of god from heaven gushing from them, man or woman. 

Where he or she is pronouncing about the last days and Judgement Day.  Or, taking a step lower, as fountains of wisdom, graced by traces of celestial intellect. In other words, the presence of those who brook neither interference nor resistance.  No questioning, objecting, differing.  Thus, I have spoken.  Thus, it shall be.  Adjudicated.  Over.

Sorry to deflate anyone’s balloon, help them return from space.  Judges are regular human beings.  A few are brighter and hardworking.  Quite a few are dumber than barbells and lazy as hell.  Judges partake of the fare of the dining room.  They visit the bathroom and read newspapers.  What they do with the latter when in the former, that’s not my business.  I must say, though, that the PPP has the business of the judiciary where it wants it.  From Judicial Service Commission to judicial service selections, everything is under control.  My hang-ups are straightforward.  If this is the grass, then what does that say about the weeds.  Those aspiring judges that didn’t make the cut. If these are Guyana’s best then this country had better start praying. 

My conviction.  My conclusion.

 THE 592 GUARDIAN. GOVERNANCE♦ACCOUNTABILITY

2026 1st Half: Leadership, Governance

The first half of 2026 is over.  It’s really 10 months, a few days shorted.  I’m counting that Guyana’s New Era began with Pres Ali’s second inaugural.  Did he do better?  Did governance in Guyana climb out of its hole?  If so, was there a first step forward or many backwards?  

 Prime Minister Mark Anthony Phillips once a soldier, is now a political guerilla fighter.  More for party, less about country.  With that handle, Mark Anthony, he could be a Roman orator or a Puerto Rican singer.  Not he.  Let it be: a proud, honorable Guyanese.  Salutations, Marshall.  Not fire, think field.  PM Mark Anthony stood in Guyana’s equivalent of the Roman Forum, and perorated.  Stabroek News will be taken care of soon.  A man truer to his word there never was.  Stabroek News was taken care of, the PPP and Mark Phillips way: it died and was buried.  No resurrection.  

 Another leader, one given to the garrulous and grandiose, is Guyana’s Master Governor.  Whoever never heard of Excellency Ali is a failed AI experiment.  In 2020, six years ago, not six months (or ten), Master Governor Ali swore to transparency and accountability.  For Guyanese to get access to information, they have to get valid passport, FBI clearance, U.S. visa, and a red shirt.  Naysayers, critics, and parasites are excluded.  No matter what they have.  Or what the law says.  Pres Ali in fits of the fanciful said that’s not his cup of tea.  British teaching.  Like Pontius Pilate, Irfaan Ali washed his hands clean of the vulgar access to info affair.  It’s Guyana’s Profumo Affair.  It’s Leadership 601.  Taught in the schools of Mao Zedong, Indira Gandhi, Narendra Modi, DJ Trump, and Benjamin Netanyahu.  Guyana’s Ali learned well.

In September 2025 (Inaugural Palaver II), he promised an anti-corruption czar.  The people at Office of the President, Freedom House, and major procurement outfits had serious cases of diarrhea.  Their world almost ended.  Wiser heads prevailed.                                                                Chatter about anticorruption czar disappeared.  And, it’s only midyear.  See, why like PM Mark Anthony, there’s such regard for HE Ali!  PM Mark Anthony and Office of the Prime Minister are still in this gospel.  They also had a fit when Excellency Ali swore to go after peddlers of misinformation and disinformation.  Somebody gave him Confucius’ masterpiece: the hardest, the longest, journey begins with the first step.  Dr. Ali has been treating himself for cramps, since September 2025. 

 Bigger than Exxon.  Have concerns about Silica City?  Roll them, then smoke them.  Need to know how all the oil money was spent?  AK Singh has a machinegun called “national development priorities.”  A load of buckshot mixed with bull-s*** sprayed on Guyanese.  Who to watch more: Venezuelans with AK-47s or AK Singh with his scholarly arsenals?  This is leadership.  This is governance.

Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo took a sabbatical post September 2025.  It was his own 9/11 great escape.  Reimages himself as Steve McQueen.  Who to put for 2030?  Policymaker or kingmaker?  Queenmaker isn’t a stretch.  Spoke of resuming his press conferences.  His handlers whispered: not the greatest idea.  PPP dirty laundry all hung out to dry.  Don’t make self a spectacle to deliver cheap shots.  The White people are appalled, shrink in disbelief (disgust also).  They have weight.  They count.  Cease and desist with all the carrying on and disgracing party, Cheddi, and the Yanquis.  Decency reigned; 2030 strategy priority took over.  Anil Nandlall couldn’t feature.  Not after the CCJ extradition embarrassment.  Though partially redeeming himself at the ICJ.  

Fellow Guyanese -the book on 2026, its midpoint.  Great news!  The second half looks identical.

THE 592 GUARDIAN♦ ACCOUNTABILITY JOURNALISM♦JUNE 2026                                                                                  ILLNESS AND DEATH, THEN MORE SICKNESS, DEATHLIKE STATE

I met Mr. Don Singh just once. Stopped and shared a few minutes in pleasant conversation. Whatever his politics, my impression was of a decent fellow. When the news of his sudden illness came, it was a surprise. Now that he has left these shores, may his soul rest in peace. To his biological family, my condolences on what has to be a hard loss. To his political family, regrets at losing a formidable worker. And, to my regret, whenever I make the mistake of thinking that things can’t get worse in this country, sink to more depraved depths, they do.

I struggle to understand how some can find joy in a man’s illness. A political man, a prince of a man, poor man, or a man who may have made himself, or be seen as, an enemy, it does not matter. There is ugly and there is ugly. To chortle privately on receiving the news of sickness is bad enough. To celebrate sickness in the vast public space of social media is degrading to an unfathomably dreadful level. It’s a sickness of a terrible kind by itself. Guyanese have really sunk to the bottom of a bottomless pit. When the savaging politics of this land of barbarians takes precedence over basic humanity, and day-to-day decency. I don’t care who is involved, so I say it now, and will say it forever. Whoever finds laughter, a time to engage in mockery, and an opportunity to kick a man, during a time of serious illness, that is one sick puppy. Sick in the head. Sick to the soul. And so sick and so callously indifferent that may have already died.

It is at times like these that I am glad to hold what is for me a prized outsider status.

Not trapped and warped by the prejudices that power local politics. Not condemned to the garbage dumpsite where ancient political grudges fester and flourish. There is so much hating, the call to forgiving may now be forever lost.

Guyanese are ghosts inside a skeleton that is overloaded and overflowing with a stream of poisons that find escape and the worst expressions when there is a human tragedy. Who is so base they see an enemy during those painful moments of loss and human catastrophe? I cast my eyes across to Venezuela and devastating earthquakes of this and that magnitude, and a full body shiver runs amok. Guyanese are so fortunate when the licks and kicks of providence were allocated. Perhaps that explains why the people of this country are so cursed. By the irresistible pull of their politics hurling them towards all that they have come to know: gutter reactions. Such was what stalked the news of Mr. Don Singh’s illness.

Now that he is gone to his creator, there was a moment for many of the social media warriors to regroup and recollect themselves. Having had a good laugh at sickness, the news of the man’s death was a line not to be crossed. Except that it was. The unbreachable breached. Treating self with profanity and vulgarity amid threnodies of grieving. Guyanese do wear their disgrace on their sleeves. All self-respect hollowed out and proudly displayed on the altar of political frenzies that burn at higher and higher pitches.

Seeing that sickness and death are causes for ostentatious displays of ignorance, it is no wonder that living has become such a corrosive burden in this divided, raucous, self-defeating society.

I behold Guyanese, who are committed to tearing apart and bringing down each other. It is all in the name of the wrenching and divisive politics that have haunted this land, in times of peace and relative quiet. Thus, I cringe in thinking of how citizens may be to fellow citizens in times that are hostile and more hateful. Often, I am glad that, though many a thought is shared in public spaces, there is still rebuffing getting any closer. The armor that protects. The safety net that upholds sanity.

May the soul of this brother, Don Singh, find eternal rest.

THE 592 GUARDIAN|ACCOUNTABILITY JOURNALISM

JUNE 2026 —BY: GHK LALL

Guyana Dev Bank: Players likely already in Place

The Guyana Development Bank (GDB) has generated much excitement.  Not yet fully airborne, but still stirring considerable interest.  Guyanese sit, wait, smile.  They are ready.  One set anticipates what’s in it for them.  To get them off the bottom. 

 The key players have already been handpicked.  Ready to rumble.  The PPP had a handful of names to choose from to move the GDB up the ladder, along the way.  There’s the way, truth, and life of Jesus.  Not the PPP way, regrettably.         

The PPP Govt has its own way.   Radically different.  In substance, results.  To condition Guyanese hopefuls, I conclude that senior positions-GDB chair, deputy chair, and CEO are as good as filled.  Done deals.  Before that GDB bill becomes law.  What’s there to debate?  There’s a seven-seat majority.  Who cares what the other sides, any Guyanese, think?  Including those who think less of the PPP’s standards of staffing?  Overseers and officers, for example.  Seven seats provide that electricity-sparking confidence [and disdain].

Known thieves are prized by the PPP Govt.  The logic is majestic.  Whoever teef caan taak.  The best are party loyalists who prosper when matters are upside down, shrouded in secrecy. 

Try this example.  The PPP loves overseers, commissioners, bank watchmen, senior bank officers who see a dog, hear a dog, know it’s a dog, but sell it as a duck or a donkey.

  Whoever heard a dog that sounds or looks like one of those creatures?  Best of all, are those who know how to keep their mouths shut, whatever the crimes committed.  It’s better when they’re part of the white-collar crimewave waiting inside that new bank.  With such trusted personnel seated, secrets stay secret.  Trouble is contained.  What happened in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas.  Substitute GDB for local color.

With $40 billion around, there’s plenty for PPP boys and girls to play around with, have fun.  There’s a guarantee, two to be accurate.  Freedom House has their back.  And Office of the President has its own magistracy and rubberstamp ready

Nah maan! Nat dese peeple.  Dem is good PPP people.  Look how much ting deh duh fuh de paaty.  Can’t abandon them.  Cannot, will not, throw them under the bus.  Not with all those sharks waiting to rip them to pieces.  It’s basic democracy: taking care of one’s own is taking care of business.  They are due first bites at the fruits of victory and policy.  So, what if they mess up, make their hands fast?  Stuff happens.  Nobody is perfect.

 The government is quick thinking: help to fix the loan documents.  Fix is preferred.  For other people: wrong color, wrong hairstyle, and wrong relationships, the GDB is just as warm and hospitable.  Welcome, sir, madam.  Take a number.  Have a seat.  Just a little wait.  The staff is out to lunch, in a meeting, gone golfing, or off to Congress.  Free seats.  Free updates.  Few could be so classless or tasteless to want more.  Wait until they hear ‘this loan application is receiving the highest consideration.  The bull just began.  No money, no love.  No $3 million loan.  Those kinds of Guyanese are on their own.  Stage is set.  Law ready. 

The games begin.  The chair’s in place.  I think that the whole kit and kaboodle (PPP kin)-chiefs and cooks are like corruption Oreos. 

Devilishly pious on the outside, wickedly devious inside.  A bank with a shank.