All it takes is one lan-tun post

By GHK Lall- If I had said that Guyana is a one high-wire act, it would have spoiled Pres. Ali’s birthday festivities. Not I, sire. Guyana certainly qualifies nowadays to be described as a high-voltage country, with its oil and gas prosperity. I hear applause from PPP Govt corners. But, if I were to ask this question, then the floodgates of fury will collapse, and hell unleashed on whoever dares raise it.

Simply put: is Guyana-Demerara, a one lamppost country? Meaning, that all it takes is for one lan-tun post to be abused in a collision, or one transmission wire to lose a sharp encounter with a truck or heavy-duty piece of equipment, for this dismal place to sunk into deeper darkness? Regardless of my thinking, or what Pres. Ali’s illustrious cohorts claim, there is reality, and it brooks neither argument nor dilution. Guyana is a one lan-tun post and one line town, if not country.

It was daytime Sunday. Cloudy, just a hint of a drizzle pending. There was no hint of what cascaded upon town and village, on stores and homes. Strains from an old song, only this time it was an excavator, not a speeding reckless driver. Generally speaking, an excavator is a turtle: slow moving, but with giraffe-like reach. But whether in slow motion, or a wildly accelerating truck or bus driver, something usually gives, and it isn’t the machines on the move.

A transmission wire, a lan-tun post, a GPL asset, or other obstacle bears the brunt of assaults. Of a driver hustling to make something to feed his family. Of a business hustling a project at a brisker pace. Wires and posts associated with the GPL tremble, totter, tumble. And when that happens, Guyanese are also floored. Down! out cold. Down into dark dungeons. A modern metropolis, medieval times. The insides of fridges and microwaves go dark, lifeless. Laptops and phones issue alerts. To a large degree, solar-less, generator- (and inverter)-less Guyanese wring their hands, wail their laments. And sweat from a fan-less environment, anxieties over irreplaceable food spoiling.

There’s the context. I’m positive that PPP Govt excellencies, beginning with Dr. Ali, wouldn’t disagree. Unfortunately, in Guyana the good times don’t last. Oil or no oil. In fact, oil made the good times harder to come by for most, with hard times extending longer. Fact of life, it is. It’s time for the tough part.

After billions budgeted, almost the entire capital city of the most talked-about nation (other than Teheran) is flooded in listlessness, darkness, and sickness. This was in the daytime of last Sunday. It’s enough to make a man forget God and leggo curses. Temporarily and quietly, naturally. In a country awash in oil money, borrowed money, and hijacked money, there is the thunder of generators competing for first place (volume) and a town flooded with alarm. How long? Why the precious power comes on and goes off in quick succession? What damage to appliances? When these accidents occur, these contingencies result, where did the engineers fail, and all those billions disappear?

What were they thinking? And whatever that was, how is it that these rolling, cascading effects from one blasted transmission wire (or lan-tun post) can cripple large segments of Demerara and Guyana? Hundreds of thousands of citizens stranded without a vital ingredient of modern life. Houses of worship plunged into dimness and silence. Homes gone quiet. Small businesses scrambling to manage however they can.

The planners and engineers surely should be able to isolate and insulate, or segment and secure, a series of areas, so that the rippling, crashing effect is not to strike the entire grid, and smash it down. All in one shot. All from one wire cut, one lamppost floored. They must have some answers on how to limit the spiraling wavelike inundations that cause so much disruption and havoc. Years and billions later, they don’t, apparently. Thus, Guyana: a one-wire, a one lamppost, a one moment away from another citywide, seems like nationwide sea of darkness. Let there be light. Guyana was excluded.