Mar­tin George

I am not sure I quite agree with the flip­pant and coy man­ner in which my fel­low colum­nist Clevon Raphael dis­missed the is­sues and ques­tions raised by Pro­fes­sor Sel­wyn Cud­joe on the top­ic of the cri­sis of black youth in Trinidad and To­ba­go. I am in­deed hap­py to see al­so, that Cud­joe has not let it go and is keep­ing the ques­tion alive on the na­tion's front burn­er, be­cause un­like the sim­pli­fi­ca­tion of the is­sue by Raphael, which is ba­si­cal­ly a "black" prob­lem which "they must utilise those 'skills' to dig them­selves out of the rut they have found them­selves in," I think it is way big­ger and far deep­er than that and it is re­al­ly a na­tion­al prob­lem, bor­der­ing on be­com­ing a na­tion­al cri­sis.

A prob­lem for the Gov­ern­ment

This is not to say that there is no mer­it in the point of view held by Raphael that the Afro-Trinida­di­an/To­bag­on­ian com­mu­ni­ty must take greater re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for it­self and its prob­lems. I couldn't agree more, but this present sce­nario is not one where we can all sit back and say let them solve their prob­lems for them­selves, be­cause we may be guilty of con­tin­u­ing to fid­dle while Rome burns and it may turn in­to a con­fla­gra­tion which may very well con­sume us all.

So Clevon, while your spir­it­ed de­fence of and ral­ly­ing to the cause of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship Gov­ern­ment is ad­mirable and your con­dem­na­tion and crit­i­cism of the for­mer PNM gov­ern­ment is equal­ly laud­able, this prob­lem is one which is go­ing to tran­scend, eth­nic­i­ty, colour, creed, class and par­ty lines, be­cause it will end up af­fect­ing us all. So you can­not say that it is not the prob­lem of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship and one would hope that the Gov­ern­ment would not be se­duced in­to er­ror by your urg­ings in this re­gard, be­cause it is in re­al­i­ty a prob­lem for the Gov­ern­ment and a prob­lem for all of us.

A Prob­lem for Cit­i­zens

When it is that a busi­ness­man can­not open up his shop with­out be­ing held up at gun­point, shot, robbed or beat­en, we know that it is a prob­lem for us all. When in­no­cent moth­ers are killed by stray bul­lets from gang war­fare in their neigh­bour­hoods, we know that it is a prob­lem for all of us. When we have four mur­ders in one day, as we did on Wednes­day last, all re­put­ed to be gang re­lat­ed, then you know this is a prob­lem for all of us.

When you are afraid to take your fam­i­ly out at nights for din­ner, to a movie or oth­er en­ter­tain­ment or re­lax­ation, then you know this is a prob­lem for us all. When you could have a dri­ve by shoot­ing of Jil­la Bowen at Movie Towne in front of all the oth­er movie go­ers and per­sons just try­ing to en­joy a re­lax­ing evening out, then you know it is a prob­lem for all of us.

A prob­lem for our In­ter­na­tion­al Im­age

When you have so many fam­i­lies pack­ing up and fly­ing out, mi­grat­ing be­cause of the state of crime in the coun­try or the fear of kid­nap­ping, then you know it is a prob­lem for all of us. This Gov­ern­ment wants des­per­ate­ly to change the im­age of Trinidad and To­ba­go. No­body is hap­py with the pic­ture that Townsend paints of us to the in­ter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty as a vi­o­lent, gun run­ning, drug run­ning so­ci­ety. No one wants to know that coun­tries have to is­sue trav­el ad­vi­sories against us, be­cause of an­oth­er mur­der as the blood of our young peo­ple runs in the streets and pools in the gut­ters, while the voice of Singing San­dra wails in the back­ground, lament­ing about life in the ghet­to.

A Prob­lem the PNM ig­nored

This gov­ern­ment has pledged that no one should be left be­hind in its new man­date and in keep­ing this promise, it must look crit­i­cal­ly and acute­ly at the cri­sis of the young Afro-Trinida­di­an/To­bag­on­ian male. It is disin­gen­u­ous and un­in­ven­tive to sug­gest that this is not the Gov­ern­ment's prob­lem, once it is a prob­lem for the coun­try, it is a prob­lem for the Gov­ern­ment and it is one that can­not, will not be ig­nored, and the fact that the PNM for more than forty years ig­nored the prob­lem or even fed and fos­tered it, is no ex­cuse and does not re­lieve us of re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to face and con­front and deal with it. I have said nu­mer­ous times that de­spite what­ev­er good it may have done, the PNM has in many ways been the worst thing for lots of young Afro-Trin­bag­o­ni­ans and while this Afro-youth cri­sis may be a prob­lem born and raised in the bo­som of the PNM, it is one that has grown up and will con­front the peo­ple's Part­ner­ship square­ly in the face. The soon­er we start ac­knowl­edg­ing this and deal­ing with it, the bet­ter for all of us.

A Breath of Fresh Air, A Ray of Hope

There is still a tremen­dous lin­ger­ing ef­fect that the breath of fresh air, new wind and good vibes which the new gov­ern­ment and par­tic­u­lar­ly the Prime Min­is­ter have all brought to bear on the na­tion. This is the hope that springs eter­nal, the hope that even this cri­sis of black youth, as Pro­fes­sor Cud­joe de­scribes, that even this cri­sis can be dealt with and over­come in this won­der­ful na­tion of ours. But this will nev­er hap­pen by bury­ing our heads in the sand or by adopt­ing the Raphael ap­proach of "it's their prob­lem, let them deal with it," be­cause the re­al­i­ty is that they are not deal­ing with it and they are not solv­ing it, and un­less we take the bull by the horns and wres­tle it to the ground, it will con­tin­ue to be a na­tion­al prob­lem, and a na­tion­al prob­lem for all of us.