Dear Editor,

AS of July 9, 2020, President Donald Trump of the USA during his term made 20,055 false or misleading claims. This was according to the Washington Post’s Fact Checker database, netting an average of 12 per day. Speaking at a press conference in the James Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House on Thursday, August 13, 2020, a Huff Post reporter, S.V. Date, asked him an upsetting and unsettling question, “Do you regret all of the lying you have done to the American people?”

Characteristically uncharismatic and unabashed and immodest, he outrightly ignored the question and moved on. The reporter had waited some five years to ask him that question, and it would seem as if he does not regret any of them. Which reminds us, coming back to home in Guyana, even the smallest child would tell you how many press conferences the former president held. This is so because the child in nursery can count from one to five with the fingers on any hand, and, that will account for another of the famous embarrassments of typical Granger-style limitation. It wasn’t as if he was secluded in privacy, or prevented from approaching the public or limited as an orator or not knowledgeable or fearful of public speaking or timid or handicapped; it was simply a case of being ashamed and scared to face the hard-hitting questions that would have been hurled at him, and to which he had no answers, and ones that he would have had to again lie his way out. He would have been unable to dodge the bullets, while shrinking, flinching and only praying for a quick end, or curtailing the meeting himself, running for his life and not wanting to sin his poor, overburdened soul any more. He took the cheap way out, lacking substance, but gravitating with alacrity to his comfort zone of oblivion. So many flimsy, lame and lazy excuses were offered by hollow incompetence to disguise the hard facts, but unfortunately ended up instead doing more damage and hurting his ego and image! If only Guyana was monitoring the lying process count, the figure would also be astronomical! To the question of regretting the lies, dishonesty, deceits, fraud, corruption and collusion, an unashamed reply would be his typical, “Naw! I am proud of doing what I did, and saying what I said, for that is what the Party is made of, and I am the head, and I support this ideal principle, because our root, strength and survival is contingent on this concept. So, please don’t blame me, for I am only doing my job of what is required of me. If I have to do it again, I would gladly do so, because that is the only way out. Rigging is our first name; that is what we live, eat, breathe, and teach, and is our dearly beloved mantra. We respect that way of life more than the Constitution, the National Anthem, and any law and order. That is our regulation: To rule, and if we had our way, the prolonged five months would have come along another five years. That ain’t no lie, but the sole truth, and who vex, vex.”

Guyana is famous and infamous for a number of things, including Kaieteur Falls and election rigging. This year, Guyana is competing with no one to make a name in the Guinness World Record Book. We already made an application as the country with the longest undeclared election recount result. Smell another rotten onion entry? Oh yea! The wily Willy is jealous and doesn’t want to be excluded. He is knocking on the door with his entry as an Attorney- General with the most lost cases! How sad, pathetic, shameful and demeaning! Yet, he stands tall, undeterred, and insists to be in the forefront to show his sly and crooked smile, ready to lie through his nose and teeth, not only to the Guyanese public, but also to spread his wings, flapping and fluttering a forked tongue in the annals of any foreign domain. Where is the pride and dignity of being an obedient servant of the court of justice, and an honourable member of the judiciary, to always uphold the law and defend what is only right in the name of truth and honesty, to display and proudly be seen in a robe that signifies decency and righteousness, not to walk the thin line that demarcates uncertainty, falsity and ambiguity, but to traverse the lighted path that broadens the horizon of reliability, legitimacy and transparency? Perhaps the days of chivalry are buried in the deeper depth of anonymity, where nobility is submerged and the zeal for its obscurity is treasured and worshipped to satiate the appetite for diabolical pleasantries. Such abominable stench must never be scented as a Guyanese fragrance again, and Guyanese must never adore such an odor!

Respectfully,
Jai Lall