While we emigrate, others immigrate to TT

THE EDITOR: Ours is a very transient nation. This has been so for many generations and will continue more so with our present generation. Those who can afford it love to travel to other countries for their holidays and for their education, and more and more of us every year seek to emigrate to other countries, particularly the USA and the UK while many immigrants from Guyana and the neighbouring islands seek to settle here by legal and illegal means.

This movement of peoples in and out of our country will, in time to come, put a heavy burden on our way of life and our economy. We shall suffer what we know as a brain drain when our most productive workers at all levels emigrate to other lands while less qualified people come in to seek permanent and temporary employment. The free movement of peoples within the Caribbean is just a good pipe dream. However, we have to put proper immigration laws in place to control the inflow of peoples. If we envision that within the next twenty years we shall have an oil and petrochemical boom in this country, then we should prepare ourselves for this. Today, our schools are overcrowded and understaffed, our roads are in disrepair, our hospitals, clinics and health facilities in disorder and our security systems ineffective. Now is the time for affirmative action. Tomorrow may be too late. We are burning the candle at both ends.

ELLIS MAINGOT
Trincity