At­til­lah Sp­inger

Au­thor­i­ty peo­ple them go dey steal

Pub­lic con­tribute plen­ty mon­ey

Na au­thor­i­ty peo­ple dey steal

Au­thor­i­ty man no dey pick­pock­et

Na pet­ty cash him go dey pick

Armed rob­ber him need gun

Au­thor­i­ty man him need pen

Au­thor­i­ty man in charge of mon­ey

Him no need gun, him need pen

Pen got pow­er gun no get

-You Be Tief,

Fela Aniku­laop Ku­ti

In case you didn't re­alise, Car­ni­val is here al­ready. In case you didn't get the memo, the Gov­ern­ment has de­cid­ed to play an even big­ger mas with your democ­ra­cy. The Gov­ern­ment bring­ing a sec­tion to beat all cock­fight. So, please Trin­bag­o­ni­ans, get in your sec­tion. Don't get tie up like a mar­ket crab how­ev­er. The gov­ern­ment sec­tion is not for you. If you are not a big sawa­tee you can't play in the gov­ern­ment sec­tion.

If you don't have some Min­is­ter in your back pock­et you have no chance of be­ing in the gov­ern­ment sec­tion. Please be ad­vised, Trin­bag­o­ni­ans, that the gov­ern­ment sec­tion does not ap­ply to rude boys and raga­muf­fin sol­diers who rob peo­ple with im­puni­ty on the Bus Route. The gov­ern­ment sec­tion is not for lumpen crim­i­nals, thugs and oth­er as­sort­ed un­savouries. These sort of peo­ple have no place in the gov­ern­ment sec­tion.

They get shot in the back. Shot down like wild an­i­mals in the bush. They get shot down like wild an­i­mals re­gard­less of the sea­son. Try, Trin­bag­o­ni­ans. Try and stay in your sec­tion. Try not to put God out of your thoughts and think that the gov­ern­ment is ac­count­able to any­body else but their friends. Get in your sec­tion. The pris­ons teem­ing with young crim­i­nals. Teem­ing with de­stroyed po­ten­tial. Get in your sec­tion. Par­lia­ment teem­ing with yes men and self-in­ter­est seek­ers. Teem­ing with bor­ing se­man­tics and vom­i­tous ar­ro­gance.

Hang Jack say he eh fraid no­body. Be­cause in the gov­ern­ment sec­tion it's like the stick­i­er your fin­gers the big­ger your post. Get in your sec­tion. Com­mu­ni­ties over­run by some­one else's im­port­ed drugs. Com­mu­ni­ties killing them­selves for fun, to feel spe­cial, to be vis­i­ble. Com­mu­ni­ties ful­fill­ing the ex­pec­ta­tions of a so­ci­ety that says they are sub­hu­man.

Get in your sec­tion. De­cent and moral­ly up­right. Pay­ing your tax­es and do­ing your job. It might not be the best, but it's a job and it af­fords you the lux­u­ry of be­ing able to buy lunch every day and lime most nights on the Av­enue. Get in your sec­tion and stay there. Don't both­er to come out at all. Don't both­er to be­lieve that you can make a dif­fer­ence. That you could mash up the band. Pass through like a band of jab jabs and mess up the mas they say they play­ing.

Hear nah, Trin­bag­o­ni­ans, a cra­paud will smoke your pipe be­fore a gov­ern­ment in this coun­try stops pro­tect­ing big busi­ness in­ter­ests. The Rot­tweil­er says we must re­store dig­ni­ty and de­cen­cy. But this place has been in­de­cent for cen­turies. And the sec­tion has al­ways sought af­ter the in­ter­est of the few, sac­ri­fic­ing the in­ter­ests of the many. The Rot­tweil­er's sec­tion is not that much dif­fer­ent from the Gov­ern­ment's sec­tion. They play­ing a dif­fer­ent kind of mas. A mas of for­get­ful­ness of past sins.

From O'Hal­laran to Gal­barans­ingh, the gov­ern­ment sec­tion would make Ali Ba­ba proud. So get in your sec­tion and take the jam­ming. The sit­u­a­tion is this. Un­der­stand that this is a big­ger pic­ture. This is a mas they play all over the world. This is a mas we have learnt from big­ger bet­ter ex­am­ples.

You think Tony Blair will nev­er end up at the Hague for war crimes? No no, that is for African despots or East­ern Eu­ro­pean mur­der­ers. You think in Amer­i­ca they will stop bail­ing out banks and start lock­ing up bankers? No, but they will cut the fund­ing for com­mu­ni­ty projects and the arts. You stay in your sec­tion that guar­an­tees you no safe­ty against the bru­tal­i­ty of a state that seems to be go­ing along its mer­ry way with­out much in­ter­est in trans­form­ing the lives of the rest of the so­ci­ety.

The sec­tion that makes you im­mune to pros­e­cu­tion is not open to you. The sec­tion that is all-in­clu­sive is not open to you. Get in your sec­tion be­cause we are get­ting ready to go on stage. There is a rope around their sec­tion. They are in the un­touch­ables sec­tion. They are the sec­tion heav­i­ly guard­ed by all the se­cu­ri­ty. Be­hind the band po­lice rough­ing up young peo­ple who are try­ing to get in on the ac­tion. They too black to be in this sec­tion.

They too ghet­to to be in this sec­tion. Plen­ty peo­ple want to get in that sec­tion. They don't mind that it is an ug­ly and ob­scene kind of mas. They don't mind that these pap­pyshow­its are smil­ing so wide, like jovial vam­pires with our blood drip­ping from their teeth. They win­ing back on laws. They go­ing down so low, they fall in a sink­hole of smug­ness. Like we don't un­der­stand. Like we can't see what is go­ing on. This sec­tion com­ing to mash up the town. And we stand­ing back and watch­ing them in awe.