Trying to upstage America
- chad vs card

by Sharief Khan
Guyana Chronicle
January 21, 2001

GEORGETOWN -- I got a phone call last week from a man calling himself George Bush (it couldn't have been that Bush who was busy getting ready to be inaugurated as President of the US of A yesterday).

The caller was upset. I made notes and promised that I would register his complaints today.

Here are excerpts from the conversation:

Man calling himself GB: "What the heck's going on down there with ya'll? You trying to upstage the big US of A, or what?"

Me: "What do you mean, sir?"

GB: "I mean how could ya'll say people who voted in your 1997 elections didn't vote? And what's this business about illegal ID card? Are you trying to upstage us folks here?"

Me: "I don't follow you, sir."

GB: "That's exactly my point! I don't want ya'll following us! The confusion in our elections last November was our business and we solved it our way. It created big headlines all over the world for weeks and kept us in the news.

"That's how it should be -- we are big people, a super power and we make big news. You little people down there have no right to try to create big news. And stop trying to steal our chad affair!"

Me: (still puzzled) "What do you mean, sir?"

GB: "Stop trying to play innocent. You voted with an ID card in your December 15, 1997 elections, didn't you? Don't lie now! We had observers down there and there were observers from the Commonwealth, the Organisation of American States, your own observers and everybody saw you and everybody else voting with ID cards!

"Didn't you vote with an ID card?"

Me: "Yes, I did."

GB: "And didn't the Opposition Leader and all the other opposition leaders, the President, the government ministers, old, young, judges, lawyers, everybody vote with ID cards?"

Me: "Well, yes. The law required that. In fact, the Elections Commission said plainly, `No card, no vote'. I carried that message many, many times in our newspaper."

GB: "So how come ya'll saying nobody voted?"

Me: "Who said that?"

GB: "Are you among the idiots down there? If you vote, and if I remember well, you also have to ink your finger with red ink when you vote, right?"

Me: "Yes."

GB: "So, if you have an ID card, you vote for who you like and get your finger inked and the ink stays on for a day or so, how come we up here hearing that none of ya'll vote on December 15, 1997?"

Me, beginning to fume a little: "I voted so how come you are saying I didn't vote?"

GB: "You're beginning to sound like a jackass! Didn't a judge rule this week that the elections were vitiated? That's just a big word meaning null and void. Kaput! It never happened! It didn't exist! You understand, now?"

Me: a little sheepish now: "Yes..."

GB: "So, if your elections are now declared invalid, if means you did not vote, right?"

Me: "I see..."

GB: "That's the problem! I don't see! I don't understand! If you voted, how come almost three years later, you're saying you didn't vote? Do you think the rest of us in the outside world are also jackasses?"

Me, getting worked up now: "Well, you had a lot of foolishness in your elections down in Florida the other day and you had the rest of the world in stitches with your comical antics.

"Everybody knew who got the most votes in your elections but your courts go and declare somebody else the winner. So don't go and play all high and mighty and prim and proper with us."

GB: "That's the problem with you Third World people! Monkey see, monkey do! You see we try a thing with our chad and you trying a thing with your card. You're trying to steal the limelight from us! And that can't work!"

Me: "What can't work?"

GB: "You daft or what? Can't you remember the confusion the hanging and dangling and stringing chads had on our votes? The little pieces of paper on our ballot paper caused by punching or not punching holes in the cards? Those little pieces of paper created so much confusion that we couldn't decide on our president for more than a month!

"But we settled the confusing little affair our way and now we have a president.

"You, however, forever trying to dwell in confusion, voted and picked your president since December 15, 1997. Our observers said you went about it the proper way by voting peacefully with your required voter ID card, went home and awaited your results.

"There was some confusion, yes. But where is there no confusion? Just look at what happened in Florida! So how come, almost three years down the line, you trying to claim ya'll didn't vote in December 1997?"

Me, very red in the face by now: "Is not me saying so. We just reporting the news."

GB: "Damn nonsense! All are involved. All are consumed! Your national poet could not have put it better! So don't try to squirm out of it! Don't think we don't know what you people down there are up to! You trying to steal the limelight again and it can't work!"

Me: "How are we trying to steal the limelight, sir? You've got your inauguration and the news agencies are still trying to track down that fishy voting chad business in Florida."

GB: "Ha! You really think you smart!

"Tell me, if you say you didn't vote on December 15, 1997 (your elections kaput, in other words your elections get capon - do you know what capon means? Your 1997 elections get capon now, right?)

Me, redder in the face: "No comment. I take the Fifth Amendment."

GB: "You learn some American law and you still trying to play smart. But if you didn't vote because it has now been declared that you didn't have elections in December 1997, wouldn't you have to undo all the things you've done?"

Me: "Well, yes. Naturally."

GB: "So it means everything that happened since then didn't happen. See what I mean?"

Me: "Yes..."

GB: "Then it means that all those people the government give house lots to got to give them back; the public servants who got that raise of pay in the Armstrong Tribunal award got to pay back the raise in pay. Right?"

Me: "I don't know..."

GB: "Don't pretend. You get a house lot?"

Me: "I paid for it."

GB: "Well, they got to pay you back. And you got to break down all those new roads, schools, hospitals, water distribution systems, sea defences and all the other things the government borrow money and built because all of that is illegal. Right?"

Me: "I don't know..."

GB: "Don't be stupid. You darned well know! And the Opposition Leader is no Opposition Leader. And there was no Herdmanston Accord, no new judges, no new Justices of Appeal, no Elections Commission and no Elections Commission Chairman; no new Chief of the Staff of the Guyana Defence Force -- you sending Major General Joe Singh back to the Army?"

Me: "I don't know..."

GB: "You're taking the fifth again...what about the violence in Georgetown after the elections and the troubles for almost two years? Didn't that happen?

"What about all those Members of Parliament who took up their seats after December 15, 1997? They would have to pay back and give back the perks they have been getting. See what I mean?"

Me: "I plead ignorance."

GB: "Smart chap. So tell me - if all these things are to happen, wouldn't the rest of the world be rushing down there to check on the confusion that's bound to follow? Do you think those thousands of people would give up their house lots so easily? Do you think the public servants would pay back their pay raise? See what I am trying to tell you?"

Me: "I take the fifth again."

GB: That's the trouble! Ya'll trying to create confusion to steal the limelight from us! It wouldn't work! We'll take you before the United Nations! We'll go to the World Court! We'll..."

Click!

The phone went dead and I couldn't call GB back. I didn't know his number.

I don't even know who he is.

But then again, I don't even know if I voted on December 15, 1997.

I know I voted, got my finger stained with red ink, spoke with the observers and read their findings which said everything was fine in spite of some problems.

Now I am told I didn't vote and I don't know how to answer my colleagues from the region and elsewhere who wonder what is it we are into again here.

I wonder -- are all those babies born since December 15, 1997 legal, legitimate?

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