This is an open let­ter to Prime Min­is­ter / Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty,

It seems that the world has start­ed mov­ing back to­wards nor­mal­i­sa­tion. In­deed, it will take many years to bounce back to the same sit­u­a­tion, as it was be­fore the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic spread.

How­ev­er, ini­ti­a­tion of steps march­ing for­ward and eas­ing up the lives of in­di­vid­u­als play a high­ly sig­nif­i­cant role in re­vival of both the lives and econ­o­my of a coun­try.

Most of the coun­tries across the globe have re­alised it and start­ed open­ing up their arms to wel­come one’s who are wait­ing to con­tribute in the re­vival and re­build­ing of coun­tries eco­nom­ic and so­cial frames.

Off course, it is per­ti­nent to un­der­stand that this is not a time for any leisure ac­tiv­i­ties—hence tourism may re­main one of the eco­nom­ic com­po­nents that will be able to stand back.

It is al­so un­der­stand­able that the weak health­care sys­tem may not be able to bear the bur­den. But the ques­tion raised here, who must en­sure that T&T should have the best health­care sys­tem for its peo­ple—a sys­tem suf­fi­cient­ly ca­pa­ble to han­dle the dis­as­trous sit­u­a­tions like this pan­dem­ic? It is no one else but you, Mr Prime Min­is­ter and your dear Cab­i­net.

Most of the Caribbean coun­tries have opened up their bor­ders for both na­tion­als and non-na­tion­als, be­cause they do tru­ly un­der­stand the val­ue of eco­nom­ic well-be­ing of the peo­ple. Then why can’t you? You are not ex­pect­ed to open up your bor­ders for every­one at this point of time. The bor­der open­ing must be done in a quite sys­tem­at­ic and planned man­ner, like­wise the rest of the world has done it with ut­most care.

At least, the na­tion­als, stu­dents, busi­ness peo­ple and work per­mit hold­ers must be al­lowed to en­ter T&T at first.

Rest as­sured no hol­i­day trav­ellers will en­ter T&T, at least by the end of this year. This is min­i­mum what is ex­pect­ed from your gov­ern­ment.

Let me en­cap­su­late the thoughts that are vi­tal for the re­open­ing of T&T bor­ders with due care and bring no ad­di­tion­al bur­den on your cur­rent health­care sys­tem.

There is a way of do­ing it with great care, like oth­er coun­tries are do­ing it in four dif­fer­ent steps and prove it as the most vi­able propo­si­tion in re­spect to their bor­der open­ing, as well.

Step 1: All in­bound pas­sen­gers to­wards T&T must bear a valid COVID-19 cer­tifi­cate test through RT-PCR, that must have at­tained at least 96 hours in pri­or to their de­par­ture.

Step 2: On­ly those pas­sen­gers would be al­lowed to en­ter T&T those must have passed through ther­mal scan­ners from the de­part­ing ports and have clear­ance from the lo­cal au­thor­i­ties of de­part­ing ports.

Step 3: Up­on ar­rival at T&T, the in­di­vid­u­als must pass through the ther­mal scan­ners and up­on any sus­pi­cion, they will be ex­am­ined by the med­ical unit de­put­ed at the re­spec­tive ports.

Step 4: Once they have ar­rived in T&T, they must be in quar­an­tine for 14 days at self-man­aged places like homes, apart­ments etc. The gov­ern­ment shall en­sure that they re­main in­side their homes for at least 14 days and will not come in­to con­tact with any one from out­side. This is quite easy to do, as the com­mu­ni­ty team would be sent to their res­i­dences and a gov­ern­ment no­ti­fi­ca­tion of self quar­an­tine shall be post­ed out­side their main en­trance. In case of any vi­o­la­tion of such shall im­pose heavy fines/penal­ties.

I sin­cere­ly be­lieve this will def­i­nite­ly help you cre­ate a soft­er im­age of your gov­ern­ment, in these chal­leng­ing times. You will be a source of joy in the lives of mil­lions of peo­ple who will be spend­ing time to­geth­er with their fam­i­lies. The prayers for bless­ings will be show­ered on you for be­ing a help­ing hand for those who are suf­fer­ing hard­ships in these eco­nom­i­cal­ly chal­leng­ing times.

Please do not make the bor­ders of T&T holy and let it be­come nor­mal and colour­ful, as it had been. Just have faith and trust in God that he will help you make your ac­tions man­aged bliss­ful­ly.

Hope­ful­ly you may con­sid­er the hum­ble sug­ges­tions.

Sin­cere thoughts across many oceans!!!

Rashid Hus­sain

via email