"We want JUSTICE!" The call has reverberated in our heads one thousand times over the last ten years from protesters, against what they consider to be unlawful, unconscionable and advantageous behaviours against them by police officers. So too, the call has resonated over alleged discrimination in one form or the other by state institutions/officials, the large corporate world and institutions of power; it could be WASA, T&TEC, the HDC etc.
The cries variously unnerve, irritate and cause a measure of unease among members of comfortable society. But do the calls also jangle as the seemingly discordant voices penetrate our questioning sub-conscious–"I wonder if they have a point?"
Indeed, many whose consciences force them to think a second time about the calls for justice may give in to some measure of dissonance/discomfort in their own minds about those calls.
Such persons may go on to still whatever disquiet is forced on them by scoffing and concluding "hypocrisy" and "dishonesty" on the part of the protesters and their calls for "justice". "After all," the thought will run, "they (the callers for justice) know their sons and daughters, relatives, friends, fellow community members and the 'good boy' who never did anything wrong" deserve the treatment they have received from the police and other state institutions and individuals; so what are they now complaining about?"
All of this and more struck me anew recently, and I wondered about my own feelings and conclusions on the strident and unsettling calls for "justice"; where do I stand in all of this?
Who do the calls for justice come from? They come essentially from groups of people living on the margins in crime-ridden, poverty-infested (culture of poverty included) areas of society, urban and rural villages reduced to being referred to as "crime hotspots."
Quite recently, an old Trinidad family name (not the kind that can be easily fitted into the hotspot group) was "demanding justice." Apparicio, Cocoa Panyol, salt-of-the-earth people who helped to develop the agricultural sector here, the mother and the grandfather with the marks of his civilisation embroidered on his face, unable to deal with the loss of their young offspring at the hands of the police, and after two years, "no justice."
Why have the calls for justice received such resonance amongst many across several geographical and social areas of the country, and this is in good and bad times, whether the "oil bread flowing" or not, is a question the whole society needs to ask its collective self. And this is despite the comfortable, uncomfortable sneering of those who must feel threatened by the calls for justice; the brazen front-up questioning and challenges posed to the society.
Inside those calls for justice are statements about the criminal justice system impacting unfairly against those from "Laventy" and the nameless towns and villages. Did those hundreds of people herded like cattle and without cause as the political directorate of the day declared a state of emergency to save their political selves get "justice"?
While that was happening, the white-collar criminals who bleed the Treasury romp about in million-dollar posh vehicles able to purchase the best legal advice to obfuscate and to frustrate the system into helplessness against them.
Look at and listen to those who scream from the sidelines; they clearly have not made it through the education system; the curriculum did not favour them, their dispositions, innate abilities; the immediate circumstances of their families did not dispose them to push academic learning, technical training as being important to how they would fare in later life; they may have heard Sparrow saying "that without an education in your head, your whole life would be pure misery yuh better off dead," but did not listen; they got caught up only in the sweetness of the melody and the charm of the young Sparrow's voice.
They clamour for justice from amidst the smoke-filled debris, the pungent smell of burning rubber for the necessity of water, for smooth roads and basic amenities which others do not have to prostrate themselves for (I almost said prostitute themselves for) but have delivered at their convenience.
The cries for justice become even more discordant and desperate as those making the calls see the value of their vote in a free-fall decline when compared to the dead thud sound of hundreds of millions of investment dollars hitting the floor of the campaign houses invested in the outcome of the election by the corporate world, by the drugs importing and exporting world.
Ironically, parts of the largesse gained from the investors is stuffed into the mouths of the callers for justice; that is during the period when numbers, workers on the ground, the wavers of flags and wearers of jerseys (red, yellow, white and green) are needed: "after de election all de bone done"–Penguin. And so the calls for justice have a ring of betrayal in the ear.
Sure there are "bad boys" who operate in an inhuman manner to each other and to those outside of their group and on the surface deserve little sympathy. But how do such young men mostly from the disadvantaged group find themselves on the margin?
Blocking our ear and turning in disgust fuelled by fear and a doubting conscience will not silence the chorus. How to reconstruct post-colonial society is above all other challenges. Next time you hear the war cry, question yourself.