…bitten by fleas

Lie with dogs…

Seems that Carl “Barry” Greenidge is finding out the truth of the proverb: “If you lie down with dogs, you will get up with fleas.” This is against the background in which the opposition has found its firmest allies in the Muckraker and the Stabber News. They’ve made common cause, of course, because they share common interests: hatred of the PPP government.
Seems the Muckraker-in-chief, Kissoon, hit Carl where it hurts most – no, not there: somewhere worse. His ego. Kissoon wrote about a Public Accounts Committee (PAC) meeting, where Carl is the chairman. The agenda item dealt with the non-issue the opposition had been braying about forever – the appointment of the wife of the finance minister in the Audit Office.
Kissoon claimed the opposition couldn’t get their way because Carl allowed himself to be misled on the Standing Orders by no one else but Gail Teixeira. To wit that Carl didn’t have a vote. Now Carl is a man with pride: he’d been in Parliament for so many years, he’d lost count of the years! He had to be advised by Gail!!  Ouch!!!
What must have peeved Carl even more is that Kissoon – and the AFC in the person of Moses ‘shut-yuh-so-an-so mout’ Nagamootoo – were completely wrong about the Standing Orders. As a matter of fact, it was the absence of an AFC member, Trevor Williams that caused the whole debacle (from poor Carl’s perspective). The PAC chairman had a ‘casting vote’ plus the eight members – four from the PPP and four from the opposition – each having one vote.
On the fateful day, with Williams playing hooky, the PPP called for a vote and the result was four for and three against. The chairman can only use his ‘casting’ vote when there’s a tie: there was none and the appointment was confirmed!! If AFC’s Williams were there, the vote would have been tied and Carl would have tipped the scale for the opposition.
Anyhow Carl demanded, and Kissoon offered, an apology. But as Carl pointed out in a recent letter, what Kissoon gave with the left hand, he soon took back with the right! Kissoon said he didn’t feel Carl should have demanded an apology since he, Kissoon, had singlehandedly defended Guyana from various dictators for decades. While Carl was swirling brandy with European diplomats? Oooooh!
That’s how fleas act, Carl.

None so blind…
The opposition APNU and AFC are in a bind on criticising the Guyana Police Force (GPF) – as we pointed out recently. They want to get rid of Rohee because of the GPF’s shortcomings – but they can’t stress the latter too much since they consider the force as a resource. Remember the taped phone conversation between then CoP Felix and PNC’s Basil Williams? You do, right bannas?
Anyhow Granger last month thought he was very clever by simultaneously criticising the PPP, the minister of home affairs and throwing in that since 1997, the police had killed 288 persons.  The police just responded by pointing out that ex-Brigadier Granger had his figures wrong. The figure was 255. Poor staff??
More pertinently, the police showed that 170 of those killings were from only three categories of serious crime. And that 37 policemen were killed during that period – the highest rate in the history of the country. But what the opposition consistently leaves out (and sadly, the police also did so in their response) is the number of civilians killed by the bandits and criminals whom the police killed.
So Granger, we should weep for “Fineman” and his gang and not for the families of Lusignan?