Trinidad and Tobago is not an ATM machine for the Caribbean, so said de PM of TnT shortly after taking office. Now, according to de garrulous Minister of National Security, Trinidad and Tobago is not a mall where everyone can enter (that one is for wunnah in de Caribbean).
And he saying this even as the Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Dookeran was publicly telling de region dat he and he counterpart in Jamaica had sorted out things after 13 Jamaicans get refused entry into Trinidad and Tobago.
In fact, the braggadocious Mr Griffith went further and “reminded everyone (presumably Mr Dookeran and de PM too) the Division of National Security falls under the Ministry of National Security (meaning him) and that has not changed”!
Further, that he had a job to do and that was to protect the sovereignty of Trinidad and Tobago and its citizens: there will be no element of flexibility, this is not negotiable, the buck stops with me! Talk yuh talk, brethren!
Now how yuh could embarrass a senior minister like Dooks like dat? How you could mek he look like a little boy so? But wait, did not Dooks go to Jamaica with the full blessing and authority of de office of PM Kamla? So what yuh saying, padna? When last I check de buck used to stop at de desk of the PM, but dis must be a small buck or a doe dat can’t mek it to Whitehall.
Iffing he had try dat wid de Right Excellent Errol Barrow, by de time he done uttering dem words, the GG woulda revoke he papers and he would be heading down Culloden Road to collect unemployment benefits. Kams, ah find yuh tekking real long to fire he!
Yuh see why Caribbean unity cannot be a reality? Is not we de people dat fornicating dis thing, is de politicians. Imagine after de Myrie matter dat 13 people from de same Jamaica get deport and instead of it going to court, mature heads say leh we talk things through. And then a fella let mout take over where head should be in charge and utter bare horse manure?
Come 2015, he name gine get erase from public life and de best he might be called is de former minister of national security. He should have a chat wid Jack, ’cause he was large and in charge of dat ministry too.
So today we know dat Trinidad is not an ATM fuh de Caribbean, but we can use we ATMs to buy things from TnT and to go to Carnival, shop in de malls, support Caribbean Airlines, buy oil and sell off we family jewels to wunnah.
And since we now know that Trinidad is not a mall even though it got plenty, perhaps we should agree on what it is.
It is a place wid de most beautiful women pun de planet; and a land of plenty oil and gas, including de kind produced by Minister Griffith.
It is de land of kaiso and soca; de home of pan; a land of warm, friendly, feting people who can laugh at themselves. It is a land of traffic;of highways like supermarkets where you could get everything from vegetables, meats, live poultry, fish and crab and chow too (ask Veoma Ali ’bout highway chow); a place wid plenty “bad drive” where a beer is a Carib and where bake and shark and crab and callaloo, doubles and roti sweet too bad; where coconut water is available 24/7 by de Savannah. Dat is my Trinidad!
I, Market Vendor, gone fuh now. You have a blessed and a wonderful day, yuh hear?
