Extending a courtesy to Hon Minister Indar

Free counsel was given before to Pres Ali, FP, FMP, and FLOP Jagdeo, PM Phillips, and AG Nandlall, among others.  Deal straight up with the Guyanese people.  So, when a difficult message has to be delivered, it’s accepted at face value, taken as scripture.  I accept that in linking these fine Guyanese to sacred texts, I risk the label of heretic.  Duty to country.  What I did for Drs. Ali, Jagdeo, Phillips, and Nandlall, I now go the extra mile, and extend the same care and courtesy to Hon Minister of Public Utilities and Flights, Mr. Deodat Indar.

Power outages are not due to lack of power generation.  They are probably due to maintenance work, or traceable to private contractors.  An educational country this is.  In the scramble to shield itself from anger over blackouts, the PPP Govt even throws one of its most sacred cows (private contractors) in front of a speeding airplane.  Chinese contractors included.  Frankly, Minister Indar disappoints.  A man of his nationally renowned resourcefulness, nimbleness, and international acclaim (the U.S. has the lead) surely could do better than maintenance and private contractors.  What future innovation could his agile faculties generate?  The tail of a stray caiman lashed an overhead transformer out of commission?  If Minister Indar is going to give the Guyanese people a political commercial, he is crafty enough to do better than maintenance upkeep and private contractors.

Reality check: maintenance has to be almost 24/7 and 365.25 days annually.  The history of blackouts would confirm.  Do a survey, dear minister, and get the goods from Guyanese (and a mouthful of rage for good measure).  Like an unannounced and unwelcomed visitor, the drop-in type, maintenance can be a disruption for homemakers, a distress for students, and a disaster for workers and small businesses.  How many can afford a generator or solar power?  After almost three decades of near-uninterrupted PPP Govt reign, and hundreds of billions spent, blackouts and the supply of electricity should be the conversation of three years ago, not today.  I donate the first three years of oil earnings to the PPP Govt and Minister Indar.  Get something done, and get that one thing done right.

I note maintenance schedules.  But the minister has to come clean with his maintenance gimmick and enlighten (a bad word choice) citizens about the, ah, outliers.  Those abrupt, jarring, series of blackouts that come in rolling, lengthening waves in the course of one half-day.  Not a week.  Not a full day.  But within a half day, one after the other.  Blackout.  Light.  Blackout.  Light.  Flicker.  Defrauder.  Those who let down their guard for a moment and plugged in an appliance, are on their own, just got burned.  Got a receipt for a damaged appliance.  Good luck!  Minister Indar needs to stop futzing around (children and elders are reading) and cease his foray into the manufacturing business.  I hear that it has its positives: more lucrative than a minister’s many roles combined.

Then, private contractors have become the convenient whipping boys.  PPP Govt boys now publicly hauled over a bed of nails.  Minister Indar picked well.  What are they going to do?  Lodge a complaint with the Integrity Commission.  Or one with the Ethnic Relations Commission and claim reverse racism.  Risk blacklisting.  Chinese contractors have a choice: the Chinese ambassador or the Guyana Police Commissioner.  I recommend the former.  Second reality check: if these private contractors are so slobbering, so friendly with lampposts, electricity lines, and transformers as to be all over them, they may not have been qualified for the work they are doing, anyway.

Clearly, Minister Indar is grasping at air.  He has run out of straws.  The PPP Govt running with AI hub, data centers, and new townships.  Where’s the power coming from, wallaba, or Venezuela?  Fix the energy supply first, with basic then projected demand factored, then there’re grounds to jump into anything and everything.  Before that, the PPP Government must reindoctrinate and reengineer itself to walk the straight road, speak with a straight tongue, give Guyanese a straight story.  Thanks for trying, minister.