Justice Arif Bulkan: Guyana devours its own

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Justice Arif Bulkan: Guyana devours its own

Dr. Arif Bulkan.  I thought that all Guyanese-from First Citizen Ali to the last citizen-would have been proud.  By the distinction of a Guyanese finally making it to the CCJ.  Not as a petitioner or advocate.  But as one of its respected justices.  Like so many things about this country, restarting and restudying it are now mandatory.

There is a problem with Justice Bulkan.  Please, pray tell, what offends so much?  Then, help with what basis for such determined resistance, such a call, that there be recusal?  To acknowledge what failing, what imagined flaw, that has contributed to his falling from the gracious considerations of those who fear?  Out of a cohort of nine, one is feared?  Is fairness, what is right and just, feared that much in Guyana?  And not by ordinary citizens, but by those who have amassed so much power in their hands?  “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown….” (Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 2, Act III, Scene 1).  Every leaf that stirs disturbs the peace of those who live with dreads, many largely earned, a few imagined.  Justice Bulkan belongs to the latter category.

It is to the credit of the Hon Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, SC, that he hasn’t lodge any objection (Motion to Recuse) before the Caribbean Court of Justice.  Mr. Nandlall, acting in his capacities as attorney general and a legal practitioner, would earn eternal encomia for coming out publicly and denouncing sharply, with all that he is capable of, any efforts to tarnish Justice Bulkan’s honor.  As a man, as a man of the law, as a man of considerable standing in this country, he can clothe himself with honor, if he doesn’t shrink from taking that mandatory step.  If he hasn’t wrapped his arms and his mind around the implications of the attack on Justice Bulkan, then I lend a hand.

An attack on Guyanese-born, Justice Arif Bulkan is an attack on all Guyanese.  By misguided attempts to scorch one of its stellar sons.  Pres Ali is made to look like a man of unwarranted vehemence, of destructive venom, when he is not.  As Guyana’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Ali has to be troubled, when what was unleashed against a Guyanese at the heights of regional jurisprudence questions his intellectual and legal honesty, through scurrilous efforts to taint him. 

If there were grounds, one millimeter, I could pause, reflect, and admit that a closer look is mandatory.  But where is that one pebble (one only) where Justice Bulkan has stumbled, dropped to his knees, due to the weight of relationships that are contrast sharply with standing norms?  Or any other weight, for that matter.

 It is no wonder that so few seek to return to their homeland, a land now so universally attractive.  Others want to return, but it’s for what they can get out of Guyana and its newfound riches.  It is damnation for those whose who still think and wish to live: ‘ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.’

It is a fitting note in which to close due to the proven notorious family ties of the famous utterer of those inspiring words.  For who was John F. Kennedy’s father, if not Joseph P. Kennedy.  Rumrunner.  Stock manipulator.  Lawbreaker.  The list is longer still.  Yet his son made it all the way to the White House and the presidency of the United States.  The sins of the father turned upside down. 

In Guyana, made up sins, fabricated crimes, are what remains in efforts to weaken Justice Arif Bulkan, attach a dark cast to him.  I offer Justice Bulkan and his family what works for me.  Adversity is an opportunity to learn humility, grow in integrity.