As our na­tion cel­e­brates its 50th In­de­pen­dence an­niver­sary, one imag­ined there would be joy and hap­pi­ness as our peo­ple unite in cel­e­bra­tion. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, this cel­e­bra­tion is against a back­drop of a di­vid­ed na­tion, high lev­el of crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty and a sense of hope­less­ness. Cit­i­zens that two years ago ex­pect­ed a change in the way we man­age our af­fairs are to­day dis­ap­point­ed as sup­port­ers of the Gov­ern­ment and those who op­posed con­tin­u­ous­ly seek to dis­cred­it each oth­er with lit­tle con­sid­er­a­tion for that which is best for Trinidad & To­ba­go. In spite of the neg­a­tives, our sports­men, our pub­lic ser­vants, our pro­fes­sion­als and hard-work­ing mid­dle class con­tin­ue to ex­cel in their en­deav­ours to make life in Trinidad & To­ba­go bet­ter. There is no ex­cuse what­so­ev­er to sub­ject the na­tion to two sep­a­rate In­de­pen­dence cel­e­bra­tions. Many may ask how we got here. The an­swer is sim­ple: free­ness. There is a ma­jor dif­fer­ence be­tween the item that we worked hard to at­tain and that which was giv­en to us. Trinidad & To­ba­go cit­i­zens have grown lazy and un­ap­pre­cia­tive as we con­tin­u­al­ly look to gov­ern­ment for al­most every­thing. We build hous­es on State lands, plant crops on State land, look to gov­ern­ment for hous­es, fi­nance, con­tracts, ham­pers, grants and jobs. We sup­port one par­ty or group to get our chance to reap the free­ness when our group gains ac­cess to the State's largesse. That is not the struc­ture that sup­ports na­tion build­ing and uni­ty.

As we ap­proach the next 50 years, there is one thing I am very sure about; that is the next 50 years will be much bet­ter. Our chil­dren know that uni­ty can­not be sac­ri­ficed for tem­po­rary self­ish sec­tar­i­an gain. They un­der­stand that all of us that are born here and very like­ly will die here must build here if we are to sur­vive. For us, there can be no loy­al­ty to an­oth­er land that has no bear­ing on the qual­i­ty of life we en­joy. Over the next 50 years we have to look at the steel­pan as our na­tion­al in­stru­ment with­out seek­ing to make the tas­sa the In­di­an ver­sion of the na­tion­al in­stru­ment. The time has come to end In­di­an and African ver­sions of things and the con­se­quent com­pe­ti­tion and ar­rive at na­tion­al ver­sions. It seems that every time there is a pub­lic hol­i­day to cel­e­brate some­thing of na­tion­al in­ter­est it first has to be de­ter­mined whether it is African or In­di­an and then en­sure that there is a sub­se­quent ver­sion to fa­cil­i­tate the oth­er side. That pol­i­cy has no place in the fu­ture. Those en­deav­ours di­vide a peo­ple and do not con­tribute to na­tion build­ing. The fu­ture Trinidad & To­ba­go will not be tol­er­ant of poli­cies that di­vide our peo­ple.

There is a lot that we have learnt from the past 50 years. We have come a long way and made our mark on the world stage. Trinidad & To­ba­go has a lot to be thank­ful for. While seg­re­ga­tion and racism seems our great­est en­e­my, it is al­so where we have our great­est achieve­ment as we are among the most racial­ly unit­ed peo­ple in the world. In­di­ans, Africans, Chi­nese, White and peo­ple of mixed races work, play, lime and so­cialise to­geth­er in a spir­it of uni­ty that is un­par­al­leled world­wide. Our last ma­jor hur­dle is to get past the po­lit­i­cal seg­re­ga­tion that re­strains us from reach­ing our true po­ten­tial. Our young peo­ple will not let that stran­gle­hold con­tin­ue. Our peo­ple are not ask­ing for gov­ern­ment grants, hand­outs or ham­pers, they are ask­ing the gov­ern­ment to do their job, to pro­vide se­cu­ri­ty, clean run­ning wa­ter, safe roads, en­gi­neer prop­er traf­fic man­age­ment, im­prove our health­care and ed­u­ca­tion sys­tem and in­sti­tute poli­cies that al­lows for eco­nom­ic growth, sus­tain­abil­i­ty and de­vel­op­ment. That is what Trinidad & To­ba­go post the first 50 years will be de­fined by. To­geth­er that must be our aim. To­geth­er we will make our na­tion bet­ter. God bless our na­tion.

Steve Al­varez