Last week I set myself three goals for 2012: to try to guide the government, to try to restrain the PNM from posing as an alternative, and to try to awaken the people of nation to our responsibility for fulfilling our potential.
And one week later I am despairing, on all three counts.
We are failing at every level of our society, in every profession, and in every aspect of governance, “irregardless” of who is in power.
And one week later I am despairing, on all three counts.
We are failing at every level of our society, in every profession, and in every aspect of governance, “irregardless” of who is in power.
If you doubt this statement just consider what we are hearing about the pinnacles of local business and UWI intelligentsia as the CLICO Inquiry unravels the irresponsibility, and, let me be careful for the time being, possible fraud which may have been embedded in that flagship local insurance and finance company.
The “closeness” of its principals to political parties (Monteil and the PNM, Duprey and UNC) brings government into the unpalatable mix, no matter who is in power.
The report of the Uff Commission, showed us how government conducts its corruption, by appointing surrogates (in the form of Hart, Annisette and others) to bleed the taxpayers, and earlier, the Musthill Commission showed how the government and the judiciary “cosy up” and then fall out as ordinary citizens pay the bills and the costs of the Commissions.
So, clearly we know that we have never experienced any competent or honest leadership. We have only known corruption, nepotism and arrogance. And we actually will celebrate fifty years of this in 2012! Instead of some form of introspection and even penance, we will have fireworks and fete!
So, were we “badlucky” to only get this type of leadership?
Of course not! This is what we are.
The report of the Uff Commission, showed us how government conducts its corruption, by appointing surrogates (in the form of Hart, Annisette and others) to bleed the taxpayers, and earlier, the Musthill Commission showed how the government and the judiciary “cosy up” and then fall out as ordinary citizens pay the bills and the costs of the Commissions.
So, clearly we know that we have never experienced any competent or honest leadership. We have only known corruption, nepotism and arrogance. And we actually will celebrate fifty years of this in 2012! Instead of some form of introspection and even penance, we will have fireworks and fete!
So, were we “badlucky” to only get this type of leadership?
Of course not! This is what we are.
The leaders we have elected fully represent our own individual and organizational (of every conceivable organization) slackness, selfishness, nastiness and the benign anarchism in which we all live.
And if we are still looking for some leader, some messiah, to take us along a better road to fulfillment as a people, we ought to stop looking. In the first place, we do not want that! We actually “Like it so”! And we like it so without any sense of shame.
Until each of us individually can understand that we cannot take our garbage from home and drive to the top of Lady Chancellor Road, or up the Arima Valley, and just dump it on the mountainside, or into pristine rivers, we cannot even begin to hold our politicians accountable for what they do, or do not do.
Until each of us individually can understand that we cannot drive along the highway shoulder to get ahead of the traffic, or try to turn across lanes even when police officers direct us not to, we cannot hold our leaders and politicians responsible.
Until we learn to teach our children that society has certain rules of behaviour and that they must respect and obey these rules, we cannot hold our politicians accountable.
And the list goes on and on. As parents, we do not have the right to swarm into our schools and accost teachers and prevent them from entering the schools.
Until each of us individually can understand that we cannot take our garbage from home and drive to the top of Lady Chancellor Road, or up the Arima Valley, and just dump it on the mountainside, or into pristine rivers, we cannot even begin to hold our politicians accountable for what they do, or do not do.
Until each of us individually can understand that we cannot drive along the highway shoulder to get ahead of the traffic, or try to turn across lanes even when police officers direct us not to, we cannot hold our leaders and politicians responsible.
Until we learn to teach our children that society has certain rules of behaviour and that they must respect and obey these rules, we cannot hold our politicians accountable.
And the list goes on and on. As parents, we do not have the right to swarm into our schools and accost teachers and prevent them from entering the schools.
I know that we believe that we no longer need to discipline our children, leaving them to be indoctrinated by American TV “sitcoms” in which rudeness and disobedience are purported to be hilariously funny, but what example do you set for your children as they watch you abusing their teachers? Your children have to grow up and face a real world one day, and you are failing to prepare them for this.
As police officers, especially as head of the Police Welfare Association, we do not have the right to demand the removal of the Police Commissioner. Is this not mutiny?
As businessmen, we do not have the right to override the law and then “call upon” the politicians we financed to regularize our deliberate flouting of the law. We all know that if Town & Country Planning deny an application for, say a multi-storey building in Cascade, the developer, a stranger to the neighbourhood, only needs to call upon “his” ministers, and T&CP is overruled!
And as we all indulge in this free-for-all clamber to rape the country, raise children who cannot read or write or understand, and take every personal liberty as a “right” notwithstanding how it may offend others, our country continues to sink in filth.
As police officers, especially as head of the Police Welfare Association, we do not have the right to demand the removal of the Police Commissioner. Is this not mutiny?
As businessmen, we do not have the right to override the law and then “call upon” the politicians we financed to regularize our deliberate flouting of the law. We all know that if Town & Country Planning deny an application for, say a multi-storey building in Cascade, the developer, a stranger to the neighbourhood, only needs to call upon “his” ministers, and T&CP is overruled!
And as we all indulge in this free-for-all clamber to rape the country, raise children who cannot read or write or understand, and take every personal liberty as a “right” notwithstanding how it may offend others, our country continues to sink in filth.
We cannot even clean toilets, or dispose of garbage properly, and we talk of becoming “developed”?
I despair about where we falling. I know parents, teachers, religious leaders and governments have failed our children. So who will stop this free-fall? Do you think anything “is going to change”, or will you accept that you have to make the change?
Look in the mirror and see who is really responsible.
I despair about where we falling. I know parents, teachers, religious leaders and governments have failed our children. So who will stop this free-fall? Do you think anything “is going to change”, or will you accept that you have to make the change?
Look in the mirror and see who is really responsible.
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