The nation is fed up. We are being ruled by imbeciles. The supposed champions of our freedoms and the will of the people are too busy pointing fingers and acting like fools. The citizens who are supposed to be holding the Government to account are more interested in fete and bacchanal. Our once great state of Trinidad and Tobago is heading towards a dark future.
While across the world people and more so the youths are dying for democracy and freedom we in this country are taking those rights and privileges for granted. Have we become so caught up in our own sick bubble that we cannot see that we are a laughing stock, governed by a cadre of incompetent self-serving leeches who are bleeding our nation? Are we so blinded by our own concerns that we do not care about our country?
Crime is not abating. In fact it is intensifying. The deluded Commissioner of Police is living in some sort of magical land where all is well while our young men are being gunned down like animals in the streets. To say that the violence is target-specific and concentrated in "hot spot" areas is to state the obvious. Does this mean that these lives have no value? What about the many who are being killed for no reason? What about the innocent who are being robbed and raped, those being assaulted and harassed? Are crimes not involved here toothese not also crimes? Or are these just community-specific?
No, crime is not going away and it is certainly not being tackled properly by the state. Hanging criminals will not solve the problem. All it will achieve is end the lives of a few and further damage our international reputation. The vast majority of murderers and other criminals will still be outside, killing and raping as they see fit.
Our country's rulers are unfit. Both the Opposition and the Government are in politics for their own benefit. While they play political games for the amusement of the public, secretly they are all friends, laughing at our collective naivety.
There are guilty parties in Parliament but they are all protecting each other. When was the last time anyone heard of the UDeCOTT scandal? When last did we hear about Piarco and LABIDCO? Why has no politician been jailed? Why have heads not rolled? Apart from being run by a ship of fools we have no policies in place to guide our country. While ministers are flying high and making trips the country is on fire.
While the world is talking about austerity and economic restructuring we are busy spending money we do not have. What preparations are being made to diversify our economy? What is being done for sustainable development and renewable energy? Are we prepared for the day oil runs out? Are we even thinking about what will happen to our government programmes when the good times are over?
As for healthcare that ship has sunk. While pregnant women suffer on operating tables doctors are arguing about political positions and jurisdiction. While the elderly are being given substandard medications and treated by doctors who barely speak English the Health Ministry is reporting all is well. We just heard of an ambulance leaving a young citizen to die. Has life become so cheap? Is an "enquiry" all that is needed? Heads will not roll, no one will lose their job, no one will be tried and shamed. That mother has lost her child but no one will pay.
That is the state of our country. There are no repercussions for people's actions. The criminals know that the judiciary is not up to the job, and the fact that untrained police officers are prosecutors in magistrates' courts and are up against high-powered attorneys speaks to the lunacy of our country.
Politicians know that all they need to do is throw out a bone about race or religion or somebody's personal bacchanal and the masses will fight each other while they line their pockets. The big fish in the crime world know that there are literally thousands of young, vulnerable youths to do their dirty work and take the rap at any time.
As far as a system of detection, conviction and punishment goes we are severely lacking. We are just like those youths in Egypt and Syria — dying for good governance. While they are being shot down by the soldiers of the state we are being beseiged and shot down by the criminals and the state is allowing it to happen.
There is little we can do about our sorry state as long as we are so easy to distract and so focused on divisions among ourselves rather than governance. When reports and opinions about public policy are published there are less than a dozen comments, but when there is a story about race or religion or scandal the comments number in the hundreds. This is just an example of how we are easy to distract and how wrong our priorities are.
If we do not hold the state to account and begin to demand action and results then as a nation we are doomed. I already see our nation becoming a collection of isolated communities. We are already living in gated, self-sufficient communities and ready to let our "bad" citizens kill each other. If we continue like this we have no future. What we will have is an overflowing prison state. This must not be allowed to happen. Wake up, Trinidad and Tobago. Your future is dying before your eyes.Wake up, before it is too late.
* Rajiv Gopie won the President's Medal in 2006 for business/modern studies. He is an MSc candidate in International Relations at the London School of Economics.
rajivgopie@hotmail.com
