What’s your story Mr Joseph

What, exactly, did National Security Minister Martin Joseph hope to accomplish by demanding an apology from the LA Times newspaper? It seems that the PNM administration was greatly disturbed over an article written by Times reporter Carol J Williams which asserted that kidnapping was a major problem in Trinidad and Tobago and that the victims were primarily East Indians. Mr Joseph’s two-page response said that kidnapping had decreased and that the police service had been given tools and training to deal with abductions. But he was particularly emphatic that foreign direct investment in Trinidad and Tobago was “robust” and that in respect to tourism “the number of arrivals has increased steadily.”

Even if this were not a straw man technique, LA Times readers are less likely to believe a peremptory Caribbean politician than an experienced reporter at a leading US newspaper. This would be so even if Mr Joseph were entirely in the right, which he is not. Ms Williams’s article may have had certain errors but its substantive theme cannot be gainsaid: that kidnapping is a major crime problem in this country and most of the victims are Indo-Trinidadians. The National Security Minister comes across as even more absurd because of Cabinet’s decision to couch its response in the form of a demand for a retraction and apology, rather than a simple listing of statistics (though even the latter would still probably have had negligible effects). Locally, Minister Joseph lost even more points by hinting that the article itself was the result of a UNC plot, since the PNM’s blame-the-Opposition reflex has become quite tired.

The PNM Cabinet seems to think that, because the article was published in a US newspaper, it has significantly tarnished the image of Trinidad and Tobago. The truth is, for anyone interested enough to read about our country, Ms Williams’s article would have contained little new information. Indeed, anyone interested in Trinidad and Tobago surely gets their news about this country, not from the LA Times, but from the local dailies, all of which have Internet editions. For such readers, Ms Williams article would have had only one surprise: that she did not also mention the spiralling murder rate. When we report on the fatal shootings that now take place virtually every 24 hours, are we misrepresenting our nation? This is the reality of Trinidad and Tobago, and highlighting it helps ensure that the Government does not ignore the problem. Even so, public opinion does not seem to have lit a fire under the PNM government, perhaps because they do not see the UNC under Basdeo Panday as a credible political threat and perhaps, to judge from Minister Joseph’s spin, because the economy is buoyant.

The fact remains, however, that crime is the number one concern on people’s minds and, of all crimes, kidnapping and murder are many citizens’ greatest fears. This is where the National Security Minister truly misstepped. Rightly or wrongly, by making a big deal over the LA Times article, the habitually taciturn Mr Joseph appeared to be agitating over a triviality while remaining ineffectual in dealing with the substantive issue of national security. The glowing picture he painted of foreign investors and tourists flocking to our shores is at sharp odds with the realities of our own people: rising crime, rising food prices, perennial flooding and, most recently, landslides. These things may not affect foreign direct investment, but they certainly affect the quality of citizens’ lives and, thus far, the Government seems unable to get its act together. While we realise it is too much to expect politicians to ignore issues of image, we strongly advise Mr Joseph to put substance somewhat further ahead of shadow.