It is said that “Justice delayed is justice denied. In a world where the innocent suffer and the guilty roam freely, justice becomes a mere illusion. The scales of justice may be blind, but they are also tauntingly unbalanced.” These truisms are playing out in living colour in the trial of those miscreants who betrayed the oaths they swore as professionals in a critical institution meant to uphold democracy in our not-so-fare country!!
Imagine GECOM was formed – after decades of Burnham playing hanky-panky with the electoral mechanisms to ensconce himself in power – to prevent the said hanky-panky by separating the policy-making apparatus from the executing mechanism – the Secretariat. The former was staffed by political types -nominated by the political parties – and the latter by the abovementioned “professionals”. The theory was that the former would play politics, but balance out each other – while the latter would carry out their tasks “without fear or favour” – in the grand tradition of British civil servants!!
And the betrayal of the nine from the Secretariat – starting from CEO Lowenfield, Dep CEO Myers, and Reg 4 RO Mingo, who were charged – is thus a sickening betrayal of just not a job, but of a tradition of some citizens forming a “universal class” working for the good of the country, and not any sectional interest!! This betrayal – unless extirpated – destroys any chance of us progressing as a nation because, most insidiously, the rot from within would ensure that any institution created for the greater good would collapse and come crashing down!!
And it’s for this reason that the various and sundry delays in the trial from 2021 – including the present delay caused by the magistrate taking a month’s “sick leave” – cannot be left unaddressed. These delays aren’t coincidences, but are further enemy action from within the judiciary – which is also replete with partisans of the PNC’s representation of one section. Everybody knows that elections are due at the latest by the end of next year, and that the conviction of these miscreants would be a powerful reminder to all good citizens of all persuasions of how far the PNC would go to hold on to power!!
Back in 2023, after several magistrates had found all sorts of reasons to recuse themselves from the trial, the AG had complained, “Magistrates after magistrates have found reasons that can’t withstand scrutiny for not proceeding to try these cases and other related cases”!! We had also seen in the COI held earlier that several witnesses called – including police officers – refused to testify!! Earlier this year, one “detour and frolic” was thrown out by the Chief Justice – one of a rare exemplar of fairness!
The Chancellor must assign a new magistrate pronto!!
…a dictator seduces
Meanwhile, over in Mad Maduroland, it’s now clear that the madman has bought out several PMs in Caricom -the majority? – who’ve adopted his line that his stage-managed elections were free and fair!! And, of course, he’s re-elected as President!! As PMs who’ve been around in politics, surely they know that it’s not just the mechanisms of the electoral machinery – like biometrics and such like – but who CONTROLS the mechanisms that’s critical!! Take, for instance, the Supreme Court that disqualified the most popular leader, Maria Machado – and will now “audit” the election results: it’s packed with Maduro’s loyalists!! Their decisions are Mad Maduro’s decision. Same with the Elections Council that announced the results – without providing the electronic voting machines’ printouts, as required by law!!
Most alarmingly, the head of the National Guard, that’s responsible for civil order – has pledged loyalty to Mad Maduro, who announced to his supporters, “Report the fascist criminals to me, so I can go find them!!”
This will not end well!!
…Culture is corrupted
Traditionally, mancipation Day is observed in a cultural way, that evokes the African way of life that was painstakingly preserved out of the Black Hole that was slavery. Sadly, this year, it was opportunistically politicised by the Opposition!!
