In the next four days some of us will be faced with the choice of red, yellow or green, as we hurtle or crawl along el camino loco �this crazy highway of our post Independence days. This might be hard for Rastas, who will want to go with all three, but for the rest of T&T the choice should present no problem. Yellow (amber if you like) and green, as every self-respecting roadhog knows, both mean mash the x, while red means mash the x even harder, and who get bounce lorse.
If we are to believe the latest opinion polls, almost as many potential voters as those who are currently lining up to go red or yellow, remain undecided, which might, if crapaud smoke an endless amount of cush, work out well for the Trinidad Humanity Campaign (the weed party). Some may even relish the prospect of a hung parliament, whose balance lies in the hands of the THC, who would make it legal for everyone to smoke their pipe and indulge their own visions, thus taking the nation to unprecedented heights. Any kind of elevation would be welcome after the depths the election campaigns have plumbed.
It would also be interesting to see T&T go really green–as in eco and even people friendly–but in the current climate of every pothound for himselves (one needs several aliases to fully cash in on opportunities arising), this scenario is as likely as Isis converting to Judaism.
If all this sounds facetious at best, or simply puerile at worst, it's difficult to take our little pond of realpolitricks seriously when regionally and internationally human and natural disasters demand attention. Hurricane Erika's devastation in Dominica seems to conflate natural disaster and human ineptitude, something we're familiar with here, whenever rain falling. There have already been suggestions that lack of regulated building procedures and planning may well have contributed to the death toll (approximately 20, with many others still unaccounted for, probably buried under mudslides) in the village of Petite Savanne, which is located in some of Dominica's steepest mountains. Lack of adequate planning must also be partly to blame for the damage to the recently renovated Douglas-Charles airport, where part of the runway was constructed over an old river course, which reopened after 11 hours rainfall.
Erika poses the same problems for Dominica that Ivan did for Grenada, and without wanting to diminish the gravity of the situation in what has, to date, prided itself on being the most unspoilt island in the Caribbean, events in Europe now highlight man-made problems which can only escalate, unless the richer European countries can agree on a common and equitable Migrant/refugee policy.
Last week's discovery of 71 corpses (including those of four children and eight women) in the back of a refrigeration truck abandoned on an Austrian motorway, has traumatised the host nation and sent shock waves through Europe, which is already reeling from the stream turn flood of those fleeing Syria, Afghanistan and many Sub-Saharan territories.
There is a cruel synchronicity in Europe's migrant crisis, which comes at a time when it is being called to account (as much as under the law of karma as that of natural justice) to make reparations to First Peoples and descendants of slaves, for its depradations in the Caribbean. The wealth and political stability financed by Caribbean plantation economies from the 17th to the 19th centuries have made Europe the logical haven for those escaping death, torture, slavery of several varieties or abject poverty.
Refugees, as I prefer to call them, have displaced tourists on the Greek island of Kos. Greece is already teetering on the fence between austerity and more austerity and can ill afford to handle the "invasion" while Italy, another major gateway for refugees, is buckling under the strain. Several thousand refugees have drowned this year attempting the crossing from North Africa to southern Europe and this trend is unlikely to alter, without a shift in policy and mindset, which Europe may not be capable of.
Australia has implemented a draconian policy on migrants, intercepting them at sea and then detaining them in Papua New Guinea for processing. There are many in Europe who approve this policy, which smacks of both xenophobia and racism. In Germany, which is reported to be willing to take up to 800,000 migrants/refugees this year, there have been violent far right demonstrations against migrants, causing a shocked Chancellor Angela Merkel to speak out against these manifestations of hatred, which recall Nazi abominations.
The refugee crisis is a dangerous crossroads in human history. Economics, race and religion all meet at these crossroads. Will more barriers be erected to protect those who have everything from those who have nothing, or can a place be found for all? We may have to wait longer for this question to be answered than to find out which colour we'll be running with here for the next five years.