AS Guyana recorded its 58th COVID-19 death on Tuesday, American billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates, the third richest person in the world, has an idea about what the best-case timeline looks like for Americans, saying, “In the very best case, two years from now, you would be, for some of the health things in particular, ideally back at where you were at the beginning of 2020.” We are bordering on the 2,000th registered confirmed case. The mismanagement from the previous COVID-19 team caused this pandemic to spread rapidly. Their lack of proper care and genuine concern paved the way for negligence and disaster. The APNU+AFC’s selfishness for prioritising an interest for financial and political power sidetracked that administration from fully concentrating and grabbing the bull by its horns. Brace yourself Guyana for a long haul; this is no “short-time” affair!

Yuri Kothiyama wrote, “People are not united because of three glaring frailties: Racism, Injustices, Inequities.” Since the Henry cousins tragedy, a few Afro-Guyanese organisations in Guyana have been clamouring for “Justice” with a frenzied intonation based on questionable substances because of being clouded from the truth that was eroded by lies. The “Black Lives Matter” group is barking up the wrong tree. So many are “jumping the gun” on the wrong footing. The President and other government ministers were originally denounced and blocked from reaching the Henry families by defenders of “No Justice No Peace,” while political agitators from the other aisle were welcomed and embraced with their racial insinuations. Only one man championed the cause of neutrality, nobility and humility, the father of Isaiah Henry– Mr. Gladston Henry. He did not identify with the senseless crowd and their dictates, on the contrary, he obscured himself from their diabolic agenda. At the end of the day, the police have confirmed that there was no political motive involved and the point of location where the bodies were found is not the primary crime scene, but the secondary one. How pathetic that the cream of the crop, Granger and Harmon, should mislead the people of Berbice and set off the domino effect of mayhem, murder and monstrosities. How stupid, silly and shameful those cabals must have felt and suffered silently, subsequently surveying the scene that revealed the many heart-warming stories that emanated, showing how Afro Guyanese rendered help to safeguard, secure and rescue so many Indo Guyanese from further brutality, massacre and exploitation. The nation salutes those brave Afro Guyanese who risked their lives to do what is right and to stand up for truth. Aren’t Granger, Harmon and the rest of the “protesters” ashamed of their acts and themselves?

Back in the days of the 1960s and 70s, there was an elderly, big, tall, burly European guy who was always lurking around “Big Market,” dressed in an old, soiled, black suit, wearing riding booths, a long, flowing, black raincoat and always sporting a black cowboy hat. His hair was long and blonde, a face with a moustache and beard and he was accompanied by an obnoxious smell. He bore a rancour, trudged along with a swaying gait, a black, bulging attaché in one hand and always wore a stern look, his eyes piercing from left to right. He was a silent, slow walker, did brandish a scary but not threatening look and was known as “Django.” Then, there was a short, slim, hump-back Portuguese guy, probably in his 60s, who was also always roaming the aisles in the vey market and around the streets of Georgetown in the same era. He always wore a white, short-sleeved shirt tucked in a black pants that fitted around his thin waist and tightly drawn by a black belt, the end part hanging loose by the right side of his trousers. He wore a menacing look, was always clean shaved, but he always carried a brick in his hand. He was regarded as mentally challenged; people stayed far from him and he was known as “British” because he would raise his hand in the air with the brick while shaking it and shouting, “British, British, the British are coming.”
Well, most of the Brits, Portuguese and many of the “well to do” others departed to the UK and then to the U.S., Canada, the neighbouring countries and the Caribbean, shortly after Guyana gained independence and Burnham began nationalisation. In the early colonial days, many Guyanese behaved as if they were the “Brits” and there was a class distinction that separated the “who” from the “who wants to know who,” and yes, the “junior staff” from the “senior staff.” Burnham tried to recreate the “massa days” by alluding to “white man days done, now is we time!” He planted the seed of racism that blossomed every election time and was harvested by his vicious predators. A lot of big guys got slapped around and had to swallow more than their saliva. The knee was always on the Indo-Guyanese community and the cry for “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” was a strangled voice that was chastised with vindictive discrimination, ignored by the affluent and encouraged by abusers. The current estranged, melodramatic Granger, an ardent enthusiast, believer and admirer, remained emotionally obsessed with a burning desire to replicate a dream, but folded as a disillusioned protégé, lacking the spine for transformation, operation and execution.

The British Army once hit the soil, they are not coming, but, this time, the American boots will tread the dirt, again, having established a base before. The ground will shake, not from the roar of the mighty American jumbo plane, but from the physical trembling of the many thwarters of democracy and the continued obstructers who are still trying to resist the legally elected legitimacy of the popular will of the people. Here comes “The Knight in Shining Armour,” to further cement, fence, protect and reinforce Guyana’s sovereignty from external forces and internal forces!

Respectfully,
Jai Lall