Backwardness on the rampage!

I missed last week’s protest march and shutdown staged by the Opposition New Democratic Party in Kingstown. This protest followed earlier ones this year and last year and if nothing else attest to two facts, that the NDP is still alive and that its mass base is still intact. If we believe in the current system of Parliamentary democracy, it must be heartening to know that the Opposition is still on its toes and prepared to speak out on matters it considers to be of national importance.{{more}} One may take issue over the focus of the protests but it certainly is good to know that those who disagree with the government are prepared to give vigorous challenge.

On the question of the focus, issues like the introduction of the Value-Added Tax (VAT), the $1.00 change for using the facilities at the Grenadines wharf, “corruption” allegations and a hodge-podge of general issues of public dissatisfaction, were the banners of the protest. The problem I have is the degree to which political parties are prepared to mobilize their supporters without giving them the type of orientation and information on keys issues. Take VAT for instance. There are several problems in its introduction and the Opposition is more than right to so raise these issues. But I get the distinct impression that what is being attempted is to play on popular dissatisfaction which easily leads to an anti-VAT position. Where is the attempt to educate, put in context, then point out shortcomings and propose solutions? Or are supporters given the line that VAT is a “wicked tax” by a “wicked PM”? There is little condemnation of price-gouging by unscrupulous merchants, rather it all “Ralph’s fault”.

As to the Grenadines wharf situation, it could and should have been better handled by the Port Authority and government. Many times the “how” you do something is as important as “what” you do, sometimes more important. For surely we should not be having national debute over a $1.00 change for the use of such facilities as those provided by the Port Authority. But the approach left room for misinformation and downright mischief, the proverbial storm in a teacup. I am a commuter. I go to the Bus terminal to wait for my bus and given the lack of facilities there, I would welcome the kind of facilities as those provided at the Grenadines Wharf. For a fee of $1.00 I would gladly welcome air-conditioned comfort and dare to think that I am not alone. Say that the matter was badly handled but to call it a “departure tax”? To say that “poor people can’t afford” the $1.00 charge?

Unfortunately for the Opposition, the court ruling against granting an injunction on the same matter must have taken some the wind out of their sails coming as it did right on the eve of the march. The response by the NDP, that the PM craftily rectified the wrong approach on the Sunday before, also was self-defeating for only one week before the NDP column had charged that PM Gonsalves had “education” but was “not intelligent”. Now, now, now! Call Ralph Gonsalves what you will but to say to the public that he is “not intelligent” is only an insult to the intelligence of our own people.

The pity is that there is increasingly a lack of sobriety in the politics of the Opposition. And if like me, you dare to raise it, there is a stream of vilification, personal and otherwise via NDP Radio. But this is doing the party harm, causing it to lose respect and credibility. Is there none among them that cannot see? A strong, credible NDP is good for our democracy since it can help to not only counterbalance any excesses of the government but give our people a sense of a progressive alternative. Sadly, that seems not to be the case. Rabble rousing and slander will get our country nowhere and certainly provide no solution to the critical problems of running a mini-economy in today’s world.

I do hope that it is not desperation but the chief spokes persons are running crazily out of control. The stock line now developed sounds much like the old Labour Party of the late seventies and eighties. If you would believe the NDP leadership, it is Cuba, and to a lesser extent, Venezuela, at the heart of all these problems. Ralph Gonsalves, portrayed as a dictator to us, is really a puppet of Castro and Chavez! Worse, in desperation an educated man like Senator Leacock goes publicly with wild charges of Gonsalves planning to register 500 Cubans to vote in marginal constituencies at the next election. Talk about the difference between education and intelligence! And when rebuked by the SVG-Cuba Friendship Society, NDP’s radio programme justifies the ridiculous charges. Are there no men of reason left?

Alleging electoral fraud is one issue but to try involve Cuban personel is insulting and damaging to the friendship between our peoples. Rabid elements are on a backward charge in the NDP, sullying its good name (or what is left of it) and making it harder for people of reason, of character and credibility to sympathise with, their cause. Just as the ULP must reflect on its own shortcomings and act to correct them, so too must the Opposition, rein in or expunge the rabid backwardness in it midst.