Congrats my police, but…
Hello, regular friends. I warn you that this one of my Ho-Hum days. And this brief piece is replete with recycled thoughts of a few years ago, dealing with our country’s negatives. I mean the deteriorating quality of life endured by the poor and those of us who once knew high standards, as well as the stress and seeming futility of our existence. Especially if we don’t traffic in cocaine, benefit from corrupt deals or participate in robbery.
But what brought all this on? Perhaps it was, it is the passing away of so many I knew over recent weeks, along with the daily dose of murder, other crimes, cocaine busts, fatal traffic accidents, political bickering, social misbehaviour and fires that ooze from our daily front pages and television screens.
Take stress. The law-abiding, working – class, “employed poor” will be familiar with the following scenario, not as fictional as it reads.
You are preparing for your low-paying day at the office store, factory, worksite or school at five in the morning when BAM! Blackout. You can’t iron your top anymore. Rain starts up. You don’t have your own vehicle so you need the rude minibus. But in the city, suburb or village, your street, pathway or dam is quickly flooded. Your shoes sole goes. A young rapacious “shoe-maker” awaits your few dollars.
Finally at work, the boss plays annoyed at your lateness as he has two cars. There is no water in the cooler and intermittent power outages affect the computers. You can’t afford the now present stress to cause you a complete breakdown because medication prices at the pharmacy are unregulated and visits to the state hospital will plunge you into even more distress. Get the picture, fellow poor? Am I wrong?
Who knows quality?
Any civilized society knows and deserves standards and quality. Frankly Speaking, we are plummeting to mediocrity’s norm. Consider these thoughts first penned years ago.
This personal therapy is only inflicted upon you because many have indicated that they share this personal and collective – and national disappointment and remorse.
Just imagine, a large scenic portion of the planet named Guyana. It is spared most of nature’s wrath, hurricanes, volcanoes, tornadoes, earthquakes, mudslides. Only floods that negligence contributes to. “Blessed” with numerous natural resources. Yet woefully unexploited for the greater good – truly an “El Dorado Unexplored”.
More than forty years after proudly breaking loose from Britain’s colonialism, we have allowed our leaders’ selfishness and our own prejudices and indifference to have fashioned a nation of citizens seemingly willing to accept a status of general mediocrity.
“Not me”, you say? Had I the time and resources I can prove that you – and I – are indeed victims of the lowest standards and a gross culture of “wha-come-suh-do”. Those enjoying the civilised, acceptable desirable standards and quality of life in this God-forsaken state are those with consistent wealth, health, education and social status.
Preferably all four of the above. Together. Achieved through hard honest work in earlier times; by inheritance; from overseas connections; by winning a substantial lottery; or from the seemingly current popular means – criminal enterprise.
Those of us still clinging to most of the old-fashioned values and virtues of honesty, legality, some faith and brotherly/sisterly concern, seem doomed to a local life of “struggle”, hustle and yes, mediocrity. A sampling of what I mean.
The low levels, the mediocre
Even the mediocre can have “middling qualities” but it is the “indifferent”, neither good nor bad nature of our national mediocrity which doom us to the lower, or lowest levels.
Take service at public utilities where, in other more respectful, regulated societies, customers would consult their consumer protection groups or attorneys, we take sloppy service by clerks, barmen, waitresses, bus “conductors”, vendors and utility workers, in stride. We have been fashioned into accepting anything from cheap plastic bowls, huge pieces of ice, “suck teeths”, indolence and disrespect – from uncouth attendants or untrained policemen. I suppose we get what we have continuously accepted. Check most public washrooms!
Consider the delays delivered by our justice system too. Judges making notes by hand, magistrates implementing their own hours, written judgements taking years. Of course, these learned officers of the courts can tell us why this is so. But where does that leave us? A society without trust in justice soon implodes.
Actually I have reason to believe that a whole generation really does not know high standards – from what good singing is, to how pictures in colour in a newspaper should look, good road construction or a real tennis roll.
The traffic chaos in Georgetown and elsewhere, frankly speaking, is to me merely another manifestation of the new culture of lawlessness and disrespect. Gross, uncaring drivers and conductors, a city without simple but crucial traffic lights or bus stops; inconsistent enforcement with regard to such requirements as helmets or no tints and the new animal-level regard for human life – all this makes you yearn to be in more civilised, orderly societies.
Most of our markets and market places are shanty town bazaars of blue coverings, sink sanitary conveniences; primitive fish and meat centres and crowded unregulated spaces, other countries would close down. It’s the norm for us. (I won’t use – or waste – space here to discuss what passes for municipality – or some “Local Democratic Council” The smelly, rusty drinking water, the irregular electricity supply and how we treat seniors and street people define our miserable quality of life. Simple, but necessary and significant for the poor but still proud, these stress dictate migration to other people’s places. What a shame.
Congratulations, police force
Just noticed Commissioner of Police Greene calling on any victims who were robbed or assaulted by any of those bandits just caught, to come forward. To identify and testify. Will it happen?
Against that query I congratulate the police on all their recent successes. The bandits are singing or must be persuaded to talk. So much could be learnt to assist in neutralizing or eliminating the criminal nests.
My apprehension is that after that solid work, disappointment might follow in the courts. The police, the streets, the communities know those bandits and what they do. But it all must be conclusively proven in our courts. That’s our civilized, democratic system. The rule of law.
The bandits still with funds will employ some of the six lawyers who know to defend bandits gloriously ell. So Commissioner/Attorney, get the best of your prosecutors. Or “Special” ones appointed. Think of the ranks who risked their lives in the shoot-outs. Or did good intelligence work. This time We are with you.
Until…
1) My two Friday wishes: (1) Put lights and stern attendants to bring order and security at the Stabroek Bus Park – now a disgrace and (2) Anglican Diocese, nearby businessmen and City Hall – de-bush and fence and illuminate St Phillips Green in the capital – now a haven for criminals.
2) Farewell Miriam Makeba. Great African songstress who died in Italy on Sunday. And one-time girlfriend of our late LFS Burnham. (She accompanied him on Independence Night May 66, And at horse races and elsewhere. Forbes always championed South Africa’s fight against apartheid!
3) Making music now in the Great Beyond: Miriam and Byron Lee with V.J as back-up.
‘Til next week!
