YouSaid · the spoken record

Irfaan Ali

lines on the record: 64
first: 2025-08-14
most recent: 2025-08-14
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“It's good people because the Qatarists now known as the mediators of the world. They've been doing a good job of that. But let me say this. So I said maybe the country that can give the most practical examples of living together and bridging divide is Guyana. Because you can come together and you can see intermarriages between religious intermarriages. You can see not only intermarriages, but you can see the coexistence of all religions, the coexistence of all our people. The only time that you see strong sentiments that are ethic in nature is when we are approaching elections, because the main opposition, and I'm going to say this, but I like to have persons here.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, no, not at all. We fought very hard for independence. But I have a lot of regards for King Charles. He has been one of our champions on the environment. He has been the greatest champion on forest. Let me be very clear on this. We can debate many things. But King Charles is the one who brought global attention on tropical forests. He spent a lot of his time convincing the global system on the importance of tropical forests. Our forest, for example, stores 19.5 gigatons of carbon. We have kept the forest standing. The biodiversity and ecological value. So, you know, I would say that he has done an enormous job. And I am doing a terrible job at answering your question days.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He himself can be involved in this. But how do we give him enough space? How do we give the system enough space to develop a comprehensive strategy on this?”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So the issue here is as a consequence of the impact of slavery on our societies and our economy, the mental health, because there is no assessment. And I always use one indicator. If you look at a society that is developed like the UK, and you look at your growing costs for mental health, and just using that one parameter and looking at the impact on mental health from slavery generation in nature, then it gives you an understanding of the type of investment that is needed. On the human capital side, on the development side. So I think that if we can structure this conversation, and I had a similar conversations with King Charles, who I believe has been doing an extremely good job at reaching out, at finding ways in which he himself can change the narrative.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Maybe, and that is something we should examine because the fact is, this is not a conversation about compensation, because there is no compensation for the indignity of slavery. But what the conversation should be is a development pack. How do we come together and work out a development pack? Maybe a development strategy for societies, deep scars and wounds as a result of slavery. And what constitute that development pack? How do we help to advance on issues of mental health, education gap, health gap? And now, of course, you would know, Alistair, that if we don't address these issues in this age of digitization and AI, these countries are going to be left far worse off or far behind if we are not able to address that gap.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Behind that struggle for freedom is one for human dignity, it's one for human advancement, it's one for the forward movement of society. And it is in that context that I believe that society has graduated to a place where we do not forget the struggles. We do not forget the deep wounds of slavery, the indignity of slavery. But we use this moment in our history to move forward and that is the conversation that reparation in its entirety must conceive.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, you know, this is a very sensitive topic for different people. There is no doubt that there's a deep scar in every society where slavery existed. But recently I said the ancestors who fought slavery and fought for freedom did not for one moment fought for the freedom only of the slaves. They fought for the freedom of a system. They fought for a systemic freedom. And sometimes we lose that bigger picture. So although this car is deep, I believe that the message”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Which was based on an ethnic mix. You know, we are a land of six different people and it is separated the population based on this ethnic makeup of the country. And that led, of course, to many difficulties dividing the country along race lines to ensure that the philosophy of communism at that time did not infiltrate and to ensure that the UK and the US had enough power, enough power to maintain the existing status quo.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So in 1950, for example, when the movement, the political affairs committee was started before, and that the purpose was to advance the cause of independence. And then for a self-governance. But what took place was that the unification of the people was divided by external forces. Even in the 50s, you had the situation in the region where the US and the UK believed that many of the countries were going into the direction of Cuba. And as a result of that, they used the structure of the population. And all of this is now released in different classified document. So they use the structure of the population.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So you grew up in an environment where you saw every single one who was older than you, who was above 18 years old, were deeply involved in this struggle of freeing the country. And in doing so, it became very difficult situation for those persons because the state would come very hard against those persons who resisted. Try to champion this democracy and this freedom. So although colonization ended, we have a historical context in this country that is very beautiful to explore. Beautiful from the perspective of what is happening in the global political landscape today.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Here in Ghana, let me make sure I say that I'm speaking in the context of Ghana throughout this podcast. So in those days also, we had major difficulties. The country was in a period of dictatorship.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Had the same opportunity, they would have been excelling just like any other young person. So in those days, for example, the average age of home ownership was in your mid-50s. Today, the average age of home ownership is in the mid twenties.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So let me say that, you know, yes, so growing up was like any other normal Guyanese working class family. I come from a family of public service. My parents were both teachers. Well, they are still both teachers because although they have retired, they continue to teach in the communities and help children all over the place. So I came from that service-oriented family structure. Of course, a lot of my relatives too were involved in farming. I myself made sure that I had my experience in farming growing up in those days was very much different from what it is today. I always say to the young people today that it is not that they are better or we are better than those before us. It is just that we have better opportunity today than they had. And perhaps if they...”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“First of all, thank you for having me. You know, my life is no different from any other ordinary Guyanese life. I still consider myself a very ordinary Guyanese with the great responsibility of leading this beautiful nation. But let me first of all apologize for the voice, my voice may not be that pleasing this morning because we are on the campaign trail. And you know how campaigns are.”
2025-08-14 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 148. The President of Guyana: The Fastest Growing Economy in the World (Irfaan Ali) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source