The need is for Generation Z (14-29 years old), and those just before it, to take the lead in the post-Independence political thinking and action if the objectives of progressive self-government, as raised as far back as the start of the 20th century, are to be achieved.
And while I am advocating that the parties/governments of the present and the immediate past have done what they were capable of, without being able to make the fundamental transformations required to achieve true independence, my suggestions are not meant to eliminate all that was good and progressive of the past generations.
My advocacy of the contemporary period and the mid-term future is for a new generation with enthusiasm, insight and most importantly, free of the baggage, hurt, hate, the inability to conceive of all of the people of Trinidad and Tobago as a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural nation locked together by historical circumstances not of our making, to be willing to overcome.
What the Gen Z-plus must create and promote is a political, human culture of true inclusion for all; eliminating the insincerity peddled on the campaign platforms of the present and past parties is an absolute requirement.
The challenge is even more difficult, but not impossible. First, the Gen Z must come to appreciate that they have an interest in the present, and most importantly in the future. The reality is that large portions of that group have displayed no interest in the politics of the past and present.
Those of us who have concluded that the politics and politicians of the present and past 65 years have done their part, and must now cede ground to other ideas and organisational structures, must be persuaded to engage a new vision and join with the present and future generations to recreate a new future, people and organisational structure.
The fact is that this is how advancement and development have historically been achieved everywhere: an advanced guard group inclusive of the mass, talking and planning for the future. That kind of mobilisation is not different to what has happened over the last 100-plus years.
At the turn of the century into the 1930s, there were those who began articulating and advancing the notion of self-government; at minimum, to be free from colonial rule. The pro-independence movement, the attempts to place economic transformation and social equity on the front burner by those who were even less well-equipped than we are in the present to effect change; but they conceived of the possibilities and took action.
Led by Gen Z, evolutionary change is being advocated - and let me make it clear transformation not with guns and violence, but with fundamentally different thinking and methods of mobilisation. We must recognise that the politics of the era from the 1950s to the present must be modernised to the requirements of a new era.
In addition to the need of Gen Z and others to move on from the politicians and their parties of the 1950s and the in-between coalitions, it is the right of the contemporary generation and those on the cusp of the future to take on the challenges of the present.
Gen Z constitutes the generations who will have the responsibility to leave for our children and grandchildren, a society united and an economic future with great possibilities, all of it minus the political and racial conflict we have not been able to resolve.
The reality is that in this post-emancipation and indentureship periods, understanding that our ancestors have come from India, Africa, China, Portugal, Syria-Lebanon, the French-Creoles and all of the different formulations of Douglas, the Travesaou, the Hak Gwai and the other in-betweens in this society of cultural richness, the politicians and their parties have not been able to successfully take on the challenge of uniting us. What successes there have been have come from amongst people and our cultural heroes.
The above are but a few of the challenges to be faced in the knowledge that we have the capacity; now it is to gain the will to do what is required.
Here is a point at which a start can be conceived of and made. As previously advocated by this columnist, let us think of an executive of technocrats, the individuals whom society has paid for their education and development to provide the transformational ideas and systems required.
It should be that we now rely on the skills, the insight and bravery to advance from the point we have arrived at. However, it’s not a matter of handing the government over to such a cadre of technicians. The insight into the way forward must be provided by the entire society of those seeking change.
The opportunity, indeed the mandate, is before the society now to advance that which has been achieved by the generations before us, with a focus on what has been left undone and that which challenges us today.
Tony Rakhal-Fraser, freelance journalist, former reporter/current affairs programme producer, and news director at TTT, programme producer, current affairs director at Radio Trinidad, former correspondent for the BBC Caribbean Service, writer for the Associated Press, graduate of UWI, CARIMAC, Mona in Mass Communications, history, politics, economics, and from the Institute of International Relations, UWI, St Augustine.
