Political Suicide.... (on the State of Emergency)

As if intent on snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, in one act Kamla Persad Bissessar has turned an entire nation against her and her government and has raised the stocks of people who are no longer even in the political arena. Now all of a sudden men like Roget and Panday are feeling the loving embrace of new friends as people warm up to the concept of them, or as the saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. What could have prompted this exercise in stupidity?

Someone said to me the funny thing is if they had set out to fail then they succeeded and I have to agree. Was this the results of a good idea gone bad?

Even men like the venerable Ken Gordon and stalwarts like Martin Daly, former supporters of this same type of draconian measures are twisting and turning to find ways to justify or even understand what exactly it is the government is trying to do. The business community is counting its losses in the millions of dollars, and the small man as usual is being hit the hardest. All businesses that exist for a 'night' trade usually employ hourly paid workers who are not getting paid now because there is no work. To compound the matter the government has chosen to do this right before the expensive school books and supplies semester, making this a double whammy for the hardest hit. Had they thought this through I am sure that common sense would have prevailed but was anyone thinking?

One of the biggest casualties of this fiasco is that the strongest weapon that a government has in its arsenal to bring order back to a disrupted society has been diluted and neutered by this missue. Akin to burning down your house to rid it of roaches, using a state of emergency to control crime is as clear an admission of failure as anything could possibly be. Despite nights of torching and looting London never declared a State of Emergency nor did they institute a curfew. They put more officers on the ground with instructions to enforce the law so I have to ask, why couldn't that have worked here?

I have been saying since May 24th that whoever is advising this Prime Minister is working dilligently against her and has as their designs the making of her into a fool. If I were to advise her now it would be to call off this state of emergency immediately and call whatever wins you have a victory. Put laws in place to follow on from here in a strong and positive manner. Invite the US to man our coasts, borders, ports and airways as our drug trafficking problem is a symptom of their drug consumption problem so it ought to be their responsibility on their dime. As we seem to clearly know the hot spots we should build police precincts and spread mobile police posts throughout them, especially at all entrances and exits to make shutting down one zone that much easier. Build the gun court and announce zero tolerance on illegal guns. Launch it with the proposed forty eight hour amnesty so who get 'ketch' after look for what they get.

Madame Prime Minister I do not know what it would take to salvage your reputation, your legacy and your government now, but ending this charade would be a massive step in the right direction. Fire your entire canbinet and start from scratch. There are good people in the society who are willing to serve their country, men and women of strong reputation and moral fiber, surround yourself with these. Make the eradication of poverty and crime your watch words, your focus and your mantra, and take steps to put things in place to show that you mean it. Create the proposed Second Chance Foundation to convert petty criminals into contributing members of society, and start to dismantle the walls of racial tension that have been building since May last year. 

There is no time like the present to begin the work of undoing this serious cock up that your Cabinet and advisors are responsible for, and the faster you fire them all and start over the better.