Social commentator GHK Lall has used the observance of Youman Nabi to deliver a blistering indictment of Guyana’s political, economic and religious establishment, accusing some of the country’s most powerful figures of embracing wealth, influence and personal advancement while abandoning the moral principles their faiths demand.
In his latest Village Voice News column, “The Prophet’s Birthday – reflections, comparisons,” Lall argues that the commemoration of the Prophet Muhammad’s birth should not be reduced to ceremonial greetings and religious pageantry. Instead, he says, it should force Guyanese to confront the growing contradiction between religious professions and public conduct.
His criticism is not aimed simply at politicians. Lall takes aim at what he describes as a broader class of “highfliers, speechmakers, and trash talkers” who invoke religion while failing to live by the principles associated with it.
At the centre of his argument is the historical Hijra of 622 CE, when Prophet Muhammad and his followers left Mecca after facing opposition from powerful commercial and ruling interests.
“The business class, the propertied class, the money class, the ruling class ran the Prophet and his people out of Mecca.”
Lall argues that the same forces—wealth, power, privilege and exclusion—are visible in contemporary Guyana, despite the public embrace of religion by many of those holding influence.
“Power and money were their gods. In Guyana, the same priorities: power and money cohabitate, reign. It’s thinly disguised idolatry.”
His broader target is the hypocrisy he sees when religious leaders and prominent believers become too comfortable with political power and wealth.
“For where in today’s Guyana are the tenets of the Holy Prophet Mohamed?”
Lall contrasts the values associated with the Prophet Muhammad—justice, honesty, humility, compassion, charity, equality and concern for the vulnerable—with what he sees as greed, political manipulation and the pursuit of influence.
He argues that the same test applies across religions. Moses, in the biblical tradition, is associated with liberation from oppression and the deliverance of an enslaved people. Jesus Christ is associated with compassion, mercy, service, care for the poor and rejection of hypocrisy and the abuse of wealth and power. Prophet Muhammad is associated with justice, charity, accountability, social responsibility and the dignity of the vulnerable.
Against those traditions, Lall asks what kind of religious leadership tolerates or participates in systems that leave ordinary people struggling while the powerful accumulate wealth and influence.
“The temples of the Lord should never be made into places subject to the whims and manipulations of the calculating. Their power and prominence should not count for anything in the holy spaces of worship.”
His criticism extends beyond Islam.
“Yet this has been the case across the denominational board.”
Lall argues that the problem is not that Guyana lacks religion. It is that religious language is increasingly being used without the moral discipline that should accompany it.
He accuses some religious and political figures of effectively creating “new prophets” out of people whose conduct, he suggests, is at odds with the principles represented by Moses, Jesus and Muhammad.
The social commentator then turns to the country’s widening economic and social divide, challenging the notion that Guyana’s growing national wealth is translating into broad-based prosperity.
“The poor of Guyana grow hungrier and weaker.”
His criticism is particularly pointed because Guyana is experiencing unprecedented oil wealth, yet many citizens continue to confront high living costs and economic insecurity.
Lall contends that the problem is not simply poverty but the priorities of those controlling the country’s growing wealth.
“Instead, the pocket and the greed of the tribe have been the priorities.”
He says the consequences are increasingly visible in political and social divisions.
“Now brother is up in arms against brother. The split. The fallout.”
Lall sees that fragmentation as a direct contradiction of the religious ideals of fraternity, social responsibility and concern for others that many public figures claim to uphold.
His closing comparison is deliberately severe.
“It is not from Mecca to Medina in Guyana. It’s from the inglorious to the inconceivable.”
Although Lall says he does not personally follow the Prophet Muhammad’s teachings, he argues that the Prophet’s history remains powerful because it reveals how societies can be distorted when wealth and authority are placed above morality.
“His flight reminds of its human sources. I see their vulgar unholy equivalents here in Guyana today.”
Lall’s message ultimately amounts to a challenge to Guyana’s political and religious establishment: religion cannot be reduced to rituals, speeches and public displays while the values of justice, compassion, honesty and service are abandoned when power and money are at stake.
