When a cat may look at a king, all bets are off. Everything is on the table. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, former English prince of the realm, now finds himself in the hot seat – arrest and detention at the pleasure of His Majesty King Charles (another Windsor). He doesn’t have the luxury of disowning Raunchy Andy, man about town, and named in the Epstein files. Henry VIII would have axed police, judges, media, and jury. Charles III is tamer: let the law take its course. Here is something for all Guyanese to weigh: a king standdown for a prince (former) in trouble, in need, in the grasp of the long arm of the law. A Former Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, said he handed some more files. In Great Britain, the monarchy curtsies, actually bends and bows, to the dictates of constitutional democracy. If a cat may look at a king, then any number of lowly cops may dare to place a prince under arrest.
It is what made England great. Long before America, England knew what it was to be great. In Guyana, almost everybody that has some relation to the PPP basks in some degree of immunity. When was the last occasion that a wired PPP insider, who happened to be drunk as fish and racing faster than a shark, got arrested in this town? Don’t recall; then try this. When was the last time that a PPP wife-beater was actually hauled in by the police, only for names to be called, the telephone to ring, and instantly there’s a German luxury machine parked outside the precinct, with engine humming sweetly, and ready to takeoff in a hurry? King Charles did his best imitation of that Roman Governor in Palestine, Mr. Pontius Pilate, washing his hands. Let the law take its course.
Anyone who remembers hearing any big leader man in Guyana standing so unequivocally, and speaking so unambiguously, when a comrade is in hot water, please share the scoop. An English king could go against the grain, stand against family. An English former Prime Minister could pass on probably incriminating files on a prince who lost the delicate aura of royalty and plunged headlong into the steamy Epstein fleshpots. Now British royalty is keeping the company of the London Metropolitan Police. The Titanic went down hundreds of years ago; the aftershocks finally rock the cradle of the British monarchy. It takes a tall tsunami to tower to that height.
There are countries of law and not men. I recommend that Guyana’s Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, SC, MP, puts on his hearing aid, dons his glasses (eyeglasses, not down his glass). Ah, the operation of the law, and majesty of the law. In Guyana, there’s this slippery slope that’s now part of the PPP Govt’s national highspeed highway. Someone gets sanctioned, and they remain connected, still on the payroll. Someone, or many, criminalizes another citizen, and once the former is one of the PPP’s protected species, then the police suddenly discover that there have no teeth, no backbone, no stones. It all depends on who the demonized and victimized are. If they don’t wear red, they might as well be dead. Let the law take its course. Well, that how it’s done here, where there is supposed to be respect for the rule of law.
In parliament, the Speaker seems a law unto himself. PPP MPs have license to flounce and bounce themselves (strip, too), on parliament’s floors, as the spirits take hold. Some are liquid. The Speaker of Guyana has now performed so illustriously in that role that he makes Oliver Cromwell of British Rump Parliament and Long Parliament notoriety look like a beginner, and gives the man from Galilee a run for his money. I struggle to make some sense of, find my way in, this dark den of democracy that is Guyana. Where men laff at the law, and are still allocated millions annually to ensure that there’s no break with them having a good time.
Let the law take its course. In England, maybe; in Guyana, definitely not in contention. What law? What course? I nominate that other grandmaster of Guyana, Mohabir Anil Nandlall, to honor this writing by saying a few words. If a cat may look at a king, I can laff at leaders, show the world how puny they are.
