Like many, I was somewhat stunned and puzzled when the Prime Minister indicated that the executive presidency held no attractions for him. Mr Manning reportedly told a small Scarborough audience that his concern was not for personal aggrandisement, but service.
As he preached, ’politics, if it is to have any meaning to the people of Trinidad and Tobago, must have a social dimension, a dimension of selfless service. That is what it is all about.’ Manning indicated that his aim in making proposals relating to an executive presidency was to find the best governance structure for the glory of Almighty God and for the people of Trinidad and Tobago.’ God works in mysterious ways, and his servants must do their part.
One supporter reportedly shouted, ’Praise God for Jesus’. One however wondered how many people took Mr Manning’s representations seriously and how many felt that he should perhaps sign up for the next round of Lord Nelson’s mythical and hilarious ’King Liar’ calypso competition? Why was such a statement ever made when every body in Trinidad and Tobago knew it was not true? Who was he trying to disarm? Was it one of those mindless and meaningless things that Trinis say from time to time? What about the double speak that we witnessed in respect of the invitation to Mr Panday. Were they of the same order?
It would appear that Mr Manning himself felt that the statement was patently untrue, and that he had to clarify it in order to avoid ridicule. One day after giving voice to his disinterest, he let it be known that he would agree to wear the crown if the people wanted him to. He however deliberately added, ’if I am around’. The latter he said was unlikely to occur since one had to have a special parliamentary majority to change the Constitution. One was reminded of a similar assertion made by Mr Panday in 1996 that the job of Prime Minister had no attractions for him. He in fact described the job as ’stupid’. When I later teased him as to whether he would accept the post if he were to win the forthcoming elections, his reply was a cynical ’try mi nuh’.
Why do politicians feel it necessary to conceal their lust for power and pretend that their purpose is ’service to the people?’ Why do some feel the need to wave Bible or other Holy Book, and declare with mock seriousness that they were the chosen of god or the people when in fact it is they who manipulate symbolic language to seduce the people into choosing them? While some do it cynically to achieve a desired objective, others seem to genuinely believe that God miraculously found them out of the millions through whom he could have chosen to channel his blessings.
One recalls Adolph Hitler telling an assembled German crowd at a Nuremberg rally, in rhetoric borrowed from the New Testament, ’that you have found me... among so many millions is the miracle of our time! And that I have found you: that is Germany’s fortune...Now that we are together, we are with him and he is with us, and now we are Germany... [and] filled with the wonder of this gathering.’ How messianic and delusional can one get!
One does not quite know how seriously to take Mr Manning’s expressed belief that he has been called by providence. How much is hypocrisy, how much is conviction and how much is delusion? Does he really believe in halos, divine echoes, and stuff, that a leader’s ’virtue’ and spiritual grounding will determine the country’s well being? Manning seems to believe that this is the case. As he told the congregation of a Woodbrook Pentecostal Church not very long ago, ’the country has tried many things. But there was one thing we haven’t tried. I will share with you a secret this evening. Righteous leader, prosperous nation.’
He opined that good Government was necessary, but not sufficient. What was crucial was ’righteous government.’ What however happens when the proceeds of prosperity are squandered? Are we then to quote the scripture relating to the prodigal son?
More recently, in June 2009, Manning told a congregation in San Fernando that he has no fear of death. People are afraid of death and the unknown because they do not have a personal relationship with God. ’If you have a better relationship with your creator, there will not be any fear.’ Manning told co-worshippers that they should not leave the choice of living a good life or an evil one to the last minute. ’God is merciful, but he is not foolish. ’
Manning made further public remarks about his commitments’ to the ’good life’ when he told Rowley that if he appeared to be drunk, he was ’drunk on God’. Unlike Rowley, whom he accused of being consumed by acrimony, hate, and animosity, he believed in the power of love. ’Love changes everything’, he told Parliament, citing a text from First Corinthians, 13. Rowley could not resist reminding him that Satan quotes scripture from the Bible for his own purposes.
The battle is thus joined both politically and spiritually. Both men are using religious doxa to bolster their political fortunes. The encounter however raises questions about the propriety of mixing political discourse with religious discourse, particularly in a multi-cultural and multi-religious society such as this is, at least officially. I say officially because Trinidad and Tobago is fundamentally a Christian society. According to data generated in a World Values study done nine years ago by MORI international, 64 per cent of our population is Christian. Forty four per cent are Protestants and 20 per cent are Catholics. Fifty two per cent of the Indians are Hindu, 35 per cent are Christians, and nine per cent are Muslim.
Most Trinis claim to be religious and regard belief in God to be a criterion for holding public office. Politicians who are atheists are deemed ’unfit for public office.’ Trinis also believe that if more people with strong religious beliefs held public office, the quality of governance would improve.
Sixty four per cent were of this view, while 21 per cent disagreed. Manning is clearly in the majority on this issue. I am in the minority in that I see no relationship between the two. The available evidence seems to show that most religious fundamentalists, whether Christian, Muslim, Hindu or otherwise, tend to be more illiberal and intolerant, attitudes that are by-products of their sense of righteousness, and their belief that they are ordained by Providence and accountable only to God in the hereafter rather than to ’Man’ in the mundane present.
Whether one is drunk on God, political power, paisa, or some other in toxicant, however, one is still drunk, and those who are drunk should not drive, since they are likely to make a mess of things politically, as Chalkdust reminded ANR Robinson in 1987.
In the meantime, we need to know what the Prime minister meant when he said that ’he and Mr Panday agreed to work towards the achievement of a new constitution in this term? Is Mr Panday the providential ’deus ex machina?’
