“It ain’t over till it’s over” is usually attributed to Yankees baseball legend Yogi Berra. My preference is for the one from the Scandinavians: ‘it ain’t over till the fat lady sings’, which causes the hair to stand on end. It has to do with the ICJ ruling on the Venezuelan Referendum handed down on Friday, December 1. Guyanese celebrated the ruling, but the dissent of Judge Robinson is what captured my attention, and which should make every Guyanese pause, and ask themselves what is going on, why the hedged language.
Judge Robinson’s specific concern is with the ICJ’s language of his fellow jurists zeroes in on that curious string of words “Guyana administers and exercises control over that area.” I also share Judge Robinson’s disagreement. “Administers and exercises control?” How does that feature, why was that ambiguous, shaded language planted in the ICJ’s ruling? Guyana exercises SOVEREIGNTY, not administers and exercises control over Essequibo; and of that there are no two ways. What mischief is embedded in that peculiar and uncertain construction? What negatives could be brought to bear should Guyana get rambunctious, meaning leadership ideas that roil the powers that be, those who can influence issues and events to come out a certain way?
Remember Cheddi Jagan and his difficulties to borrow a few dollars to pay public servants back in the early 1960s, and how he got nowhere with the people now on Guyana’s side. In the context of the border controversy, “administers and exercises control” is too weak, too watered down, and looks too much on the worrying side to me. Did somebody hold back something, and gifted themselves an ace in the hole for later deployment? That is, if Guyanese head honchos’ responses to later business developments do not go according to plan? The plan of the people who conjured that oracular dispensation.
Nobody should be talking or adjudicating along the lines of “administers and exercises control” when it is the sovereignty of Essequibo that is involved. Certainly, it is jarring coming from the vaunted chambers of the ICJ. What else could be going on in there beside straight jurisprudential probity and integrity. I don’t like it. No sir! In fact, I hate the leeway in those seven words, compressed to four for ease of reference. There is too much room in that tricky phrase. Too much room for maneuvers by Venezuela. Too much room for big power manipulations, of which there is only one that matters.
Yeah, yeah, I hear about the independence of these tribunals, and the sanctity of their deliberations and judgments. But, by God! something is rotten in the Hague, and it stinks to the high heavens in that business about “administers and exercises control.” Now, I put the multimillion-dollar question in the center of the table: did the United States of America arrange a preemptive controlling hand for itself? As in a patented check and balance card held in reserve, through a classic carrot and stick approach.
Put more bluntly, Guyana’s ruling PPP and its leaders (and all other political leaders) are given a not so nuanced expression that ties their hands. It is that everybody here had better behave themselves, and toe the American line, so that all will remain well. But get too smart (or too full of self and adventurous), and the Venezuelan dogs of war could be summoned into action and let loose again. There is no guarantee about how much in Guyana’s favour any ensuing developments would be. I think that that ICJ ruling puts Guyana’s head in a tiger’s mouth. Wiggle too much, and that proverbial ton of bricks could come tumbling down all over Guyana.
I think that this goes back to what I have been saying all along, the Americans are very guarded about the PPP Government, and the tendency of its leaders to freelance. “Administers and exercises control” instead of exercising full sovereignty is a stiff way to keep on a short leash. The men at the helm of the PPP Government today have just been hemmed in; they had better go the extra mile, bend over backwards to ensure that they keep their side of commitments made to get Venezuela off Guyana’s back. For the time being. Talk about a hanging sword of Damocles.
Separately, I am floored that Vice President Dr. Jagdeo has not been quick on the draw with that, what I shall call, Guyana blind spot. It was the same illustrious Vice President Jagdeo, who had raced out of the blocks to jump all over Judge Sandil Kissoon’s decision in that Exxon matter about full coverage for Guyana. The VP did not mince words then, even went too far in my book, and should not have minced any now with this one-legged ICJ concoction that leaves Guyana exposed and vulnerable. Oh, and open to command and control by those who are responsible for that piece of judicial gamesmanship. Perhaps, he is too occupied talking about how eligible Venezuelans must be allowed to vote, and he is already counting them by the thousands.
