to quote a friend: “When you call a state of emergency, you signal to the world that the country is in a state of disarray and that natural functions of the “protective services” are insufficient to maintain stability in a country. Once people perceive instability it’s difficult to shake that mindset – for non Trinis outside, and even some Trinis”
to say the least, we are in a perpetual mess. and the chaos will not end in 15 days because this is cosmetic dressing on a deep skin wound. we are experiencing the equivalent of the application of gauze bandaging to a cancerous tumor.
last year, author Ezra Aharone wrote an article on the modern mis-education of black youth in america. part of what he discussed were the simple aesthetic changes used to mask a deeper, complex problem:
Children worldwide learn that the earth is round and 1 + 1 = 2. These are universal facts that are neither Black nor White. However, the functions and end-uses that nations apply such facts to educate kids are neither neutral nor universal. Hence, “Acting White” is a troubled way that youngsters express something that we have lacked the power to change – Which is that the functions and end-uses of America’s “System of Education and Intellect” are based on skewed purposes, processes, and interpretations that place European images, ideals, and institutions as the central and supreme frame of reference and relevance. This lack of intellectual and institutional equality, encapsulates the essence of the mis-education identified by Dr. Woodson.
Our mistake is that we consider it sufficient to simply insert Black people into existing White institutions, and then paste tidbits of sanitized versions of “Black History” into America’s larger body of education. By contributing without properly correcting the end-uses and known partialities within America’s “System of Education and Intellect,” we have allowed “the problem to masquerade as a solution.”
part of the problem in t&t is governance and yet they, and their SOE, are currently masquerading as the solution. you do not order a state of emergency because there were 11 murders over the weekend. you know when you order a state of emergency? when citizens took to the streets in protest by the thousands (a la 1970 black power movement). an even better and more fitting time to order a state of emergency is when the jamaat al muslimeen attempt to take over the country and shoot up parliament.
this recent action by the government is not only undemocratic and unnecessary, but it displays a gross misunderstanding, a gross mis-education and a dire disconnect from the citizenry. we need to bear witness to the madness and to label it madness – poor mental health. any attorney general of a country who applauds the killing of two suspected bandits cannot be of a sound mind.
this is not to say that nothing should be done. but you cannot fix a problem that took years possibly centuries to create in 15 days or 48 hours. and you cannot kill people as part of your effort to fight crime. and as the masquerade continues, the blame remains on the mis-educated and misguided youth while the people who put the guns and drugs into their hands and who are the true profiteers of their small-only in the larger scheme of things- crimes remain unscathed.
how do you impose a SOE without a detailed plan or analysis of the crime situation? the first announcement said one set of areas; by the time it reached the news this had been changed. at first the SOE was limited to areas labeled crime hotspots, now the entire country is under the SOE but only designated areas have curfews. yesterday, members of the media were not to be given passes because they are not an essential service; today, members of the media seeking passes will be judged on a case-by-case basis. the lack of a purposeful plan makes me feel like officials are playing with the lives of the more than one million people who live in this country.
a state of emergency is supposed to be the last resort of a government, what will they do next? (what more will we allow should be the real question)
Zahra Gordon 
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