H@rd Truths By GHK Lall – An Independent in Guyana

Apr 28, 2023 Features / Columnists, News, The GHK Lall Column

Kaieteur News – To be an Independent in Guyana is a wonderful vision. I like the clean lines, strokes conveyed in that word Independent. Two words, really: political Independent. Is such a creature, such presence, actually possible in the Guyana of today? Though there are considerable doubts, it is not an insurmountable undertaking, definitely not an impossible dream. This is because the circumstances are not in favor; still, at the end of the day, it all comes down to one priceless element. It is the nature of the man or woman, the caliber of character that wraps the banner of Independent around self.

GHK Lall

As a disclaimer, this writing is prompted by the media announcement of a candidate proudly proclaiming that he is running as an Independent in upcoming political contests. I wish him the best is the first praise offered; his courage in doing so is the second commendation tendered. But I make clear this has nothing to do with this brother, his candidacy, or that he sees it fit to run. It is less about the man and more of the concept, and all those attributes that have to be inseparable from that despised label in Guyana. Indeed, this is what to be an Independent has come to signify here: detestation. At its core, to be an Independent is about the reality, ideal, and challenges embedded in the category of Independent within the local political scheme.

Independent means no affiliation now, none intended at any time in the future, no matter how attractive the overtures to be otherwise. Rather forlornly, such has not been what has graced us in the political arena. Because of this, the word Independent when employed in a political context has come to represent a ploy, merely a ruse to get recognised, and a foot in the door. In Guyana, that would be the holy of holies, to wit, the good favors of the ruling, dominating, rampaging PPP Government, and its top people. There is only one, and in his hands the fates of Independents have transformed into, if I will be pardoned, what could not be more distant from the intended ideal. In fact, the label of Independent is as good as gone. Whether it was through ambitions harbored deep inside, or attractions extended most artfully, or simply the guiles of a particular platform in politics that leads to personal rewards, any of those, or some combination of them, this has been the reality of Independents in Guyana. I will not insult anyone by attaching the prefix of ‘so-called’ to their claims to be Independent through and through. I admit it is difficult.

I will give the fairness that visions may have started out that way with real sincerity and real authenticity. Then, those ideals about being a true Independent in the domestic domain collided with the powerful realities of political Guyana. Regrettably, when such collisions have occurred, Independents lost all their sense of purpose, of direction, and of regard for the trust vested in them, and collapsed into ignominious heaps. I cast no aspersions; all I do is simply to point to the high heaps, and there are the skulls of the fallen, the decay of what began well, but them succumbed to whatever came their way. It has been an assorted bunch, and includes not only political aspirants, a la the lengthy list from the last elections, but also those from the proud realm of the press, the pious practitioners in spiritual sanctuaries.

To that noble grouping, I can add others who were once thought to be above the fray, or at least held themselves out to be so, and those insistent that they were wholly outside the clutches of the two dominant political presences in this town. Due to the new standard I am working to inject into local conversations, I refuse to name anyone. They are known commodities, with proper baggage that trace to them.

Politics aside, to be worthwhile of the classification of Independent in Guyana, and genuinely so, one has to be without need, devoid of certain personal impulses, barren of what makes other men and women excited. It can be a tad on the burdensome side for some. I would assert too many, come to think of it, when a census is done. For to be an Independent means willingly abandoning (and this is dangerous) the powerful ties to race, to money, and to what seduces others. In Guyana, one has to be for, and it had better be nothing else.

For if one is not for, then one is against. This is the incredible narrowness to which Guyana’s politics, and the life of Guyanese, has constricted. According to the partisans, there is no such animal as a centrist, a neutral, a self-made, self-assured, and self-contained man or woman. It is either for, and damn those who are against. Most Guyanese have shown so far that they cannot take the second half of that brutal equation. How one measures up in the crunch is what recommends re bona fides about being an Independent. It is the one who stands steadfast.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)