‘Today, I weep for my country’

I cry for our people when I listen to one of our ministers expand on the tourism dollars which will be lost as a result of the crime against our English guests in Tobago and yet our people continue to be murdered with impunity and the silence is deafening. Are we to assume that the tourism dollars are worth more than the lives of our people?

I cry each day for the lack of resolve to fix our education, our roads, our crime, our water supply and our hospitals. Is it that we are waiting for one of our foreign guests to be affected before we address these problems?

I cry each day when I look back on over the three score years of my life and note that every administration which we have had has failed our people miserably and we can point to the flight of our money to Panama, Canada, England and Shanghai — all to fill bottomless pockets without fixing our country.

And I continue to cry each day that after more than 47 years of Independence that we have still not taught our people to fish and we continue to keep them subservient so that we can continue to give them hand-outs in order that we can continue to control them. Oh what progress we can have when we can have statesmen and leaders charting our destiny rather than politicians.

In the autumn of my years, I hope that by some miracle that we, as a people, can awake from our slumber and understand that collectively the power is in our hands to make a difference. It is already too late for generations of our young people.

We shall not achieve any semblance of First World status if we do not hold our politicians accountable and responsible to us, their employers, to discharge their duties and responsibilities towards us.

And the tears continue to roll down my cheeks and I am in deep despair for our people and for our country.

Shazan Ali

San Fernando