Honouring our legends, Emancipation Cricket Festival

EDITOR: Give to everyone what you owe them: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honour, then honour (Romans 13:7). A festival is a national event and should be the focal point where everyone rallies around so that those honoured experience the goodwill and blessings of our people. Consequently, we should expect all the authorities concerned to be fully on board, or, at the minimum, be given the respect that is due to them.

In the Cricket festival we should expect to see the President of West Indies Cricket, Dr Kishore Shallow in the VIP lounge. It is unfortunate that that may not be so because apparently, he was not consulted.

Since we are celebrating emancipation from slavery, those in the forefront advocating for our full emancipation and reparations should also have a seat in the VIP lounge.

A seat should also be reserved for Dr Godwin Friday because he has the majority support of the people of the country. A national festival calls for all the influential persons to be fully appraised so that they can use their influence to boost attendance.

We live in an age where disrespect is becoming too common. Every organization and institution has structures, manuals, standard operating procedures that codify respectful operations that should be followed. When this is not done the management personnel feel sidelined and this affects morale negatively. In most cases people will enthusiastically support a cause if they were given due respect.

If we are spending our own resources, we can do whatever we want, but organization resources require approval. When a woman spent about a year’s wages to anoint Jesus with an expensive perfume, it drew disapproval from the other followers. Some may well argue that the emancipation cricket festival is a valuable celebration, but citizens are well within their rights to be intimately involved in approving its financing if they are expected to bear the cost.

Anthony G. Stewart, PhD