H@rd Truths by GHK Lall – Lawsuit is the wrong way to go

Oct 18, 2023 Features / Columnists, News, The GHK Lall Column

Kaieteur News – I read in the media that former Auditor General, Mr. Anand Goolsarran, has filed a lawsuit against former President, Bharrat Jagdeo. This is regrettable, a step I wished that Mr. Goolsarran had not taken, one that I hope he would reconsider and withdraw. Some other thoughts are now shared.

GHK Lall

Mr. Goolsarran is a Guyanese for whom I have some regard. He has served this country well, was highly hailed and heralded by the 1992 PPP Government for his exposures of what went down before under the PNC with the nation’s monies and accounts. This was in the decades, especially the last years, before the PPP came into power. Mr. Goolsarran was the toast of the PPP and all its leading people. How the times have changed! For when the shoe is on the other foot, and sniperscope is aimed at the party’s forehead, how the tune in the PPP hierarchy changes. Noteworthy is that Mr. Goolsarran has not changed, for his prior Auditor General’s cap is still firmly fixed on his head, his skills intact. Pardon me, sir, but an old hunting dog does not lose its instincts when governments change. Perhaps, the incumbent auditor general should take stock.

The trouble is that Mr. Goosarran has now sinned in the eyes of top PPP brass. He still delivers the same clinical interpretations and revelations, but this time as they relate to chronic PPP Government failures. Now, the same Mr. Goolsarran features in the list of PPP Government enemies, as such exists in Jagdeo’s calculations. So, the former auditor general is abused, besmirched, and subject to various revilements by the PPP, with Jagdeo allegedly reveling in his role as abuser and defamer in chief. Mr. Goolsarran certainly thinks so, and has initiated moves via the courts to correct the situation, restore the dignity due to him. For Jagdeo’s part, when he descends to what the former auditor general (and international civil servant) feels wounded by, it is not something that is momentary, but what has become customary. Weekly press conferences are Exhibit A that quickly exhaust the entire alphabet.

Indeed, the sum of the Vice President’s attitudes and actions has been largely a body of vindictive and menacing work, which speaks for itself, and from which more of his own people distance. This has moved Mr. Goolsarran to act. I would give Jagdeo a special, well-earned award for leadership driven to hubristic recklessness, and particularly against people who either disagree with him, or make him look bad. I, myself, have inklings of this brother’s acute malevolence, his virulence of condition, but I continue with this work of shedding light; openness always beats secrecy. The more he rails and rants, the more I pity the brother, this leader, and try to help him. But the man Jagdeo will hear no truth beside his own, and with which there is every contradiction and controversy that could be imagined.

I mention all this for a reason, and for Mr. Goolsarran’s consideration. The more that Jagdeo, and the odious Palace Guard that owe their existence to his twitches and rictuses, hurl their toxins and defamations, the more he should feel honoured. I do. To Mr. Goolsarran, I say think of this: there is a whole government, an entire party apparatus that is on edge about what is going to come out next from certain sources, which guarantees significant readership. There is some honour there, and so the viciousness and likely defamations of leaders, plus those who have lost all their self-regard, are held as the reward for speaking to truth. I point to their hands now stained with blood and mud and dung.

The message for Mr. Goolsarran is that suing is an option, but I wouldn’t. Many were upset that I refused to sue when the circumstances clearly supported, but on that I wouldn’t budge. I will be damned if I stoop so low as to make use of Jagdeo’s weapon of choice and suppression, for instilling fear and broadening silence; that has its own people. I will be doubly damned if I give him the pleasure of plunging in the lawsuit gutter that has become his special reserve, the cesspit, that he now relishes so much. That is Jagdeo’s exclusive domain, and in that he can cavort and gambol to his heart’s content.

I would agree that my position is extreme, and what I recommend to Mr. Goolsarran may be seen as unthinkable. I understand. For there is the power of the pen, and of the will, and there is no army that can overcome. It is what is mightier than all the swords in the arsenal of men like Bharrat Jagdeo, and his ilk. It is what conquers all, not just today, but perpetually. The arc of justice is best served by the products of the pen and of minds untrammeled by deceits, trickeries, and myriad of other obscenities. Don’t sue, Bhai Anand; show them who is bigger, and who is better. The VP’s dodging of service exposes him. Withdraw the suit, I say.

(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.)