A couple of years ago right here in Trinidad a woman was being raped in the Queens Park Savannah. When she screamed for help five men arrived and proceeded to help the rapist.
Disgusting?
Yes.
After losing the the 2002 election under the weight of the allegations of massive corruption, Basdeo Panday found himself hobbled by his main man of business and the rest of the musketeers. Facing the real possibility of the rest of his life in jail and abandoned by all but his die hard supporters, the internal wranglings within the party began to take their toll.
Both Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj (Panday's on again/off again heir apparent/saviour) and Jack Warner (a political parasite that he couldn't shake) wanted political power and both saw the East Indian vote as the only viable vehicle to achieve it.
Stung by public rifts and quarrels, the UNC found itself shedding more members than it could afford to lose and was struggling to hold itself together, culminating in the rise of a new party within the Opposition. Although they were destined to fail at the polls, it was that spin off (the COP) that eventually set him (Panday) on his way. The split now presented the east Indian voters with two choices; the UNC and the COP.
Knowing that politics had a morality of its own and willing to sleep with just about any devil for power, Bas (Panday) embraced Jack Warner (quite possibly the most dubious character on our political landscape) in the hopes of rebuilding HIS party and consigning the defectors to the political cemetery. This was to prove harder than he thought as well as his final undoing, as in exchange for financial support (campaigns cost money), he showed Jack the inner workings of the Party.
Jack got the better deal and, sensing that Panday was politically wounded, bided his time and waited on his opportunity. He would not have to wait long. Adrift and almost leaderless, the Opposition was breaking apart. The only way out for this master showman was to accede his critics and call an internal election, a choice he would later live to regret.
Jack Warner continued to wait for the right moment, and while waiting he discovered something about the East Indian community that created a political opening. He discovered that Indian people were weak, cheap and easily fooled. He realised that trinkets and baubles still mesmerized them and he decided to test the water. Knowing he could not do it on his own (he still needed acceptance) within the community, he twirled this way and that; Ramjack, Kamjack, Panjack, whoever would dance with the devil found him a willing dance partner; all the while learning, all the while gaining East Indians trust. Testing to see just how far they would let him go, he orchestrated a coup from within the belly of the Party and removed Mr. Panday's man in Chaguanas (Rambachan) and had him replaced with a Barbie doll (because it was just a test and he was all but confident that it wouldn't stick). To everyone's surprise it worked and worked well. The power base of the constituency exploded into fractious fighting and the vacuum left his appointee with power that he could control from without.
I am not sure whether he planned for this but what happened next shocked even me, (and I consider myself an astute political observer), but rank and file East Indians lined up to drink the poison the devil poured for them. Leaving Bas and Ramesh stunned by defeat, they also abandoned Winston Dookeran's fledgling COP en masse, leaving the shell of the East Indian alternate party minus a voter base save for the Westmoorings crew who like a good bacchanal and hung around for the after party.
Scrambling to remain relevant, the COP started meeting with every fringe group that would meet with them and (as they still had the stale smell of political respectability), desperate to replace their now 'lost' support base, formed an Alliance of the willing, the unable and anyone else who wanted a jersey.
Trying their best not to remain 'just' an alternate to the UNC, the COP's assets and management team flung themselves at any cause and was put to good use gathering supplies to ship to Haiti after the earthquake for much needed media attention.
They also continued to position themselves as the anti corruption party and used their cadre of lawyers to nip at Patrick Manning's heels by focusing attacking Calder Hart and the UDECOTT.
The PNM, reeling from their own internal wranglings over the same Calder Hart, and attacked for their failure to deal with crime and traffic, was ill prepared to have a defeat handed to them by way of the UFF report on corruption in the construction sector and a marriage connection between the party's chief bagman and a Company that was awarded millions of dollars in state contracts.
(As an aside I have often wondered why Manning allowed the party to fail at crime management. 90% of the crimes were being committed by blacks, so only his party had the racial authority to subdue them. I have been told that crime was aimed at the East Indian community to keep them off balance and I have no way of proving if this is true or not, but this country's middle class only seeks political voice when their quality of life is threatened. The PNM would have been free to loot forevermore had the party focused its attention on the management of crime and traffic).
Fighting a weak and wounded opposition in the then Panday led UNC, any politician worth his salt would have played it out, abandoned Hart to his own devices, launched an investigation and try to weather the storm.
Not Patrick Manning, no, he is way too arrogant for that. How dare we question his morality, didn't we see he was building us a church?
Instead Patrick went on a tirade in grand style, bashing left then right, and by the end of the stumbling tantrum had surrendered power to the media and the anti PNM-ites and was facing a vote of no confidence within the party. Summoned to a meeting of party financiers he was put on notice and read the riot act. Feeling isolated and alone, he did what any Machiavellian would do.
Summon the troops and go to war.
Nothing distracts like excess. Marshall your support, erect and define your enemy and fight him to the death unites your people behind you and distracts everyone from the issues.
In his now trademark fashion Patrick Manning dissolved Parliament and called elections.
Believing in his heart that East Indian people were eventually going to spit Warner out and that Kamla was going to crumble under the onslaught and pressure of the competing interests and ideologies trying to be a Party, the Prime Minister launched a barrage of blistering attacks against all comers and embarked on a massive campaign that caught the Alliance (Dooks and friends) by complete surprise. Not expecting such a turn about, they were caught with their pants around their ankles and were left with two very difficult choices - face this election with the weak hand they had and risk losing (again) and fading into political history, or go begging at the table Jack was laying.
History will prove that their zeal for unseating the incumbent blinded them to the real opportunity available, to change the politics and get the House of Representatives functioning as it was meant to once again. Had they chosen the high road, there was a very real chance that they would have earned sufficient seats in the Parliament to function as a buffer against extremes and abuses by Government, and to reintroduce proper constituency representation. This would have opened a way for other citizens of the Republic to get more involved, and the democracy could have prospered. Alas they grabbed onto the bird in hand and joined the 'Coalition against Manning.'
Now the deed was done and dusted.
In a show of bi-partisan, bi-racial and quite possibly bi-polar showmanship, all the irrelevants put their signatures on a document swearing allegiance to Jack through his puppet Kamla in Fyzabad.
Having done so, these people are now required to sing for their supper and are prepared to do it with fervor and in grand style for status and props as the jockeying is set to play out in earnest.
This is where we stand as of three days before nomination day:
- The PNM is on the offensive, with the Prime Minister once again fighting off his main challenge in the person of Dr. Keith Rowley who, as of this writing, has been screened but has not been assured a place at Manning's table. The party has failed at protecting the citizenry, but this has not been used as the reason for unseating them.
- The COP has sold its supporters to Jack Warner for position in a party they will have no say in and are now all but irrelevant. Given seats to fight that they still can't win, they fool the middle class into believing the 500,000 plus sugar worker party has capitulated to them. Misdirection, making the mind believes what it needs to believe has done its job well.
- Labor has drawn a minimum wage line in the sand that they know full well to be untenable and have also sold out their membership for a place at the banquet and some respectability.
- NJAC has brought some much needed 'African-ness' to the East Indian table just for the illusion of 'National' and 'Unity' so Jack doesn't stand out on the platforms.
- The electorate, long ignorant of how politics really works and who really benefits from all this tribal positioning is preparing to exercise their one minute of democracy on May 24th and then roll over and complain until whichever side finally puts the last screw of dictatorship in.
Regardless of the outcome, we are all but out of time.
Great article...
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