ON THE HOUSE - NO RED HOUSE FOR MANNING (RHOCD)

I feel there should be an iced magnum of champagne and a cold crystal flute dripping “dew” onto the desk’s smooth synthetic surface as I write this, my third anniversary piece. And the bubbly should be of a name not more inferior to Taittinger’s and a gift from the Office of the Prime Minister.

Not that I could probably drink it then. A political commentator as unapologetic as I’ve been has to beware the source of the liquids she imbibes.

I’ll have to settle for a sip of the tepid homemade orange juice resting in the unrefined glass to the right of the computer’s monitor. I allow myself the slightest of smiles. I’m wondering, “What the hell were you thinking three years ago, Suzanne? You challenged a Prime Minister! You could be drinking champagne now.” But I do know what I was thinking. I recall perfectly my feelings the precise moment this column was born in April 2003, a few months after the Prime Minister announced his plan to takeover the Red House.

I remember being truly appalled and ashamed that Trinidad and Tobago was led by a Prime Minister who could so undemocratically oust the Parliament from its headquarters because he wanted a bigger office. What Parliament wanted mattered little to him, apparently. I know I felt very Third World and I believed that the Red House takeover was the most disturbing of actions from a Prime Minister who in my view was displaying dictatorial tendencies from way too early in his term. I wondered if the Prime Minister was of the opinion that he could do what he wished with our nation because he didn’t have any real opposition in the UNC.

I know I decided that this column, which had begun as parliamentary commentary but had evolved into a broader political opinion piece, would be the perfect vehicle for telling Patrick Manning what I thought of his high-handed behaviour, even if he eventually got his way and made the Red House his own. I recall that I wasn’t particularly worried about what Mr Manning and PNMites “would and could think or say” as I’ve been asked by many a reader over the past three years. I think I just assumed that both man and party would have to comprehend that freedom of expression, guaranteed in TT’s Constitution, means you don’t always like what you hear.

I had my opinion — and it was that the Prime Minister did not have carte blanche to do as he fancied; the Prime Minister and his people held their own views.

What I didn’t expect was that the column would be as embraced as it has been and I hope I don’t sound like I’m bragging. I simply never anticipated that so many strangers would have approached me to start conversations about politics, that just so, people would begin listing their complaints about life in Trinidad and Tobago under the Patrick Manning led PNM. And I’ve chatted with them all. I confess though that on each and every occasion, I’ve wanted to ask, “Why aren’t you speaking out? Your point of view is as valid as mine, probably more. Why do you remain silent if you’re fed up of crime, and sick of seeing billions of dollars spent on buildings that we’ll never be able to maintain? And if you are so worried about inflation, let Patrick Manning know what’s on your mind. Tell him that you want social services departments that are truly equipped to assist the needy, the neglected, the child, the senior citizen, the infirmed, that you need a meaningful education system and that you will take for your petro dollars a few decent hospitals.”

Other incidents in the past three years have made me chuckle. In February, at the 2006 Panorama finals on the Track a well known PNM activist, right hand on right hip, gave me a good long cut eye. I smiled at her and then I took her photograph as a souvenir. A few years ago, at some event or the other, I came face to face with Hazel Manning and Franklyn Khan. She was gracious. He grinned. I grinned back. I now grin once more as I remember another occasion on which I had a migraine, but was not sure I should accept the injection of painkillers from the administering nurse because she’d inquired in a manner that sounded a tad too reproving, “Are you Suzanne Mills? Suzanne Mills of “No Red House for Manning?” That encounter became a column. I attended a dinner in March and the host who I was meeting for the first time greeted me not as Suzanne, but as “No Red House for Manning.” I’ve also had occasion to laugh when asked, “What does the RHOCD mean again?” And I’ve whispered conspiratorially, “Red House Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.”

Today, April 9, 2006, I wish without sentimentality to express my gratitude to Sunday Newsday for permitting me to publish once more and for the last time, “NO RED HOUSE FOR MANNING,” as I want to thank all readers, PNM, UNC and neutral for going the distance with me. I’m certain that when he reads this and I know he reads the column, the Prime Minister is going to open a magnum of bubbly. It won’t be one I’ve sent. But Patrick Manning should not be precipitate: I’m going nowhere, just expanding the column’s content and style and thus, changing its title, too. Am I conceding victory to Mr Manning? That’s for readers to decide. While you do, it’s orange juice on the Red House, which is not for Mr Manning.

suz@itrini.com