Two separate events occurred yesterday that reflected the bad Master Plan under which this nation is being governed.
In the first event, a notorious defender of the status quo was in the environs of Port Zante taking instructions, and giving assurances, regarding the favorable fast-tracking of certain applications to the Government.
In the not-too-distant future, some details on this particular transaction and related matters will be provided, if necessary. Suffice it to say, meanwhile, that a number of things are being fast tracked right now.
This defender, like the one who got land under different names, and the other who was involved in the passport scam and was allowed to walk free, and like the other who’s trying to tamper with certain illegal immigration processes , and like many other defenders, is, simply by being a defender, acting as though ‘licensed’ under the Master Plan.
Others are involved in scandals, disrespecting and disgracing the public offices which they occupy, and hurting people. But nothing comes of it. They too have ‘licence’ under the Master Plan.
Of course, the one who did a $2 million hustle recently is walking the streets free, chest high up in the air, with full confidence, while young men are in jail for relatively minor matters. I don’t know what ‘licence’ he has.
And there are more.
The second event also involves a defender of the status quo. But she’s different from those above.
She’s a poor, unwed mother. She has a house, but, like many, many others, she’s simply not making enough money to make the monthly payments, and to keep up with her other expenses. In fact, she hasn’t made a payment in years. And she owes tens of thousands of dollars.
She also owes SKELEC thousands of dollars. And she can’t afford to put food on the table for her children. Some nights they all go to bed hungry.
She also can’t afford to pay the costs of getting her children ready for the upcoming school term.
And it has all gotten to her.
Two nights ago, she was talking about taking her own life.
All of these people share something in common. They defend the status quo.
But while some of them do so, at least in part, because of their declared commitment to Labour (mutilated and desecrated as it is), all of them do so because they believe that if the status quo was to change they would, in the case of the bigger shots, lose their privilege and ‘licence’ under the Master Plan, and in the case of this poor single mom and those like her (and they’re many, believe me), they’d lose their homes, they’d have to pay up their electricity arrears, they’d lose the little jobs they have providing them with the pittances that can’t keep their heads above water, and they’d have nobody, no politician, to whom they could go to ask for help.
Privilege in the case of the first set, and survival in the case of the rest. But in both cases, dependency.
This has not come about by coincidence. In my opinion, it’s all been part of a Master Plan to maintain the status quo.
And while I do care about the two sets of people (we’re all children of the same almighty, loving, merciful God), it’s the poorer ones, the ones who’re trying faithfully to survive, the ones who live a daily cycle of dependency, despair and desperation, about whom I’m most concerned.
They’re the ones who go to the meetings, who make the most noise, and who’re called upon to cuss, mock and abuse, in order to keep the status quo intact. They’ve not been encouraged to see behind the deceptive web in which they’re trapped. And they’re being conditioned to feel indebted to Douglas.
Now let’s take the same single mom to whom I referred earlier. Deprived and disrespected as she has been, she has nevertheless felt indebted to him.
But suppose her mortgage payments and her electricity bills were lower. Suppose there was no VAT on food and medication. Suppose she didn’t have to fork out so much cash to pay for her kids to get equipped for school.
Might she then become better able to cope? Might she and her kids eat better, feel better, and probably be more productive? Might the visits of those trucks and vans from the hire purchase establishments to the homes of poor people like her to take back furniture and appliances be reduced?
Might the NHC and SKELEC revenues improve? If so, would that be better for the Government, which could then reduce the pressure on taxpayers, and create a better overall economic environment?
Might introducing those reliefs be better emotionally, economically and financially for that single mom and the thousands like her, and better for all of us?
Might she stop feeling indebted to Douglas?
If your goods and services are priced too high, your revenue and your business will suffer.
Denzil Douglas knows that. Yet, faced with setting mortgage payments, electricity rates, VAT and a host of other expenses beyond, or within, the range of our citizens’ capabilities, especially the poorer ones, he chose to set them beyond their means.
Why did he do so?
In order to keep them dependent on him, and feeling indebted to him. To keep then falling short of the mark and then coming to him for relief. Choking them, then easing his grip from around their throats for a minute with a goody or two. That way many of them would come to see him as their saving grace, and not as the person who’s been choking them to death.
Remember in 2012 he told them that he wanted to cry when he saw a lady’s electricity bill? And remember how many people actually believed him?
And the deeper into debt, desperation and despair they sink, the greater would be their fear of losing him.
So when our single mom owes $3,000 to SKELEC, $22,000 to NHC, etc., if the Master Plan is working, she’ll believe that every now and then she can get a $500 here or a $600 there, and that he’d never throw her and her kids out of the house.
But the fact of the matter is that her debts keep piling up, because they’re too high for her, and she simply isn’t getting the real relief that she needs.
So what’s that relief that she needs?
A Master Plan that would make her truly independent of Douglas or any other politician. That’s the relief she needs.
Under this Master Plan, just as Douglas asked the creditors of the Government to take a haircut, because of his incessant profligacy, it’s now the Government’s time to take a haircut from these poor people.
Those massive mortgage arrears will never be collected. Never! So they must be forgiven in their entirety up to a very recent date. Likewise for electricity arrears.
In addition, the mortgage and electricity rates must be reduced, so that the people, as well as businesses, can have more breathing room, and the economy can get a fair chance to catch itself.
Further, the VAT must be removed on food, medication and funerals, and generally reduced wherever else possible.
Douglas might try to provide these reliefs at this eleventh hour, but if he does, it’d be too little, too late for him, because it’s he who caused this mess in the first place, and he simply cannot be trusted to maintain this relief after an election.
In any case, no man who says that he’d sell a citizen, yes, sell a citizen, is worthy of leading a nation.
A bad Master Plan out, a good Master Plan in.
