One simply gives up on this silly country
On Tuesday morning, I dropped into the GRA’s office to collect a driver license application. While waiting for the metal detector, the lady in front of me was refused entry. I saw the security rank holding her shirt sleeve indicating it was inappropriate. After I passed through the scanner I asked why she was barred. I was told that her shirt sleeve was too exposing. I did not agree. I asked to see the dress code, was directed to it and it unambiguously stated; “sleeveless shirts.”
The lady’s shirt had a short sleeve to her elbow with a split in the middle. Her shoulder blades were not exposed; her arm pit was not exposed. Based on the GRA’s sartorial requirements, the woman was not in violation. I made a fuss and insisted that they were wrongly interpreting their own dress edicts. They let the woman in.
During my contestation, the woman was quiet as a lamb. How can this stupid country treat people like this? Why is God allowing this country to exist? This lady might have travelled from a distant place to have a needed document and was turned down by a security rank that cannot interpret GRA’s dress code.
I am now about to say something that is not within my character make-up but I will still spell it out because reality cannot be washed away. Many security personnel that work at the GRA, the High Court and other places are not people with advanced training or extensive exposure to life so their understanding of aesthetics are not highly developed. These people simply do not know what constitutes a sober colour.
The High Court dress code bars loud colours. Who enforces such a ban? Security people who may not have completed all the stages of high school. Am I being insulting? No I am not. If it is a fact, how am I being insulting? Can such people aesthetically define sober colours? They cannot and that is because I have seen their failure at the High Court many times when they enforce the rules.
The policeman at the High Court refused entry to Denis Atwell of the Alliance For change claiming that his light-coloured blue jersey was too loud. It was not.
Former security personnel for Minister Raphael Trotman, Gordon April, was refused entry into the magistrate court because he refused instruction to tuck his shirt into his trousers’ waist. April told the policemen that he was wearing a shirt jac. I intervened and clearly said to the policeman that the design of the shirt was in the shirt-jac category therefore it was meant to be worn outside the trousers.
April had a landlord and tenant case yet was refused entry. The only reason he was not evicted due to his absence was because his wife and I pleaded with the magistrate.
One year before the Gordon April incident, Leonard Craig, current Chairman of the Broadcasting Authority, was refused entry into the High Court because of the identical demand by a security rank as what occurred with April. Craig told him that he was wearing a type of shirt-jac and it was a shirt-jac design.
These security personnel, wherever they are stationed, haven’t a clue what fashion is all about. Many, many innocent citizens travelling from far off places in Guyana to do business with public institutions are turned away because of the primitive mentality that has taken over this country. If I wasn’t there that lady on Tuesday morning would have suffered a bout of depression if she had to travel way back to Region Three or to Region Five.
But it just goes to show how oppressive this country remains. The GRA has a dress code. The judicial system has a dress code. But can one ask if they have a performance code? You cannot go into the High Court with a multi-coloured dress whose colour is loud but you can file a writ in the very High Court and die of old age before the trial commences. This is not an accusation against the judges but the system itself. The GRA is notorious for bad service.
You have to wait for four hours just to get your application for driver’s license processed. Try importing a medicine to save your child. By the time the GRA personnel at the wharf or the post office is finished with you, the medicine has expired and your child dies. There is no dress code for participation in the Golden Jubilee celebration on May 26. You don’t even have to wear clothes. Your underwear might just do it for you.
