24.5 C
Belize City
Friday, March 29, 2024

World Down Syndrome Day

Photo: Students and staff of Stella Maris...

BPD awards 3 officers with Women Police of the Year

Photo: (l-r) Myrna Pena, Carmella Cacho, and...

Suicide on the rise!

Photo: Iveth Quintanilla, Mental Health Coordinator by Charles...

The sour taste that lingers

FeaturesThe sour taste that lingers
The PUP faithful keep saying that the “media” is letting the new government off the hook, that the “media” is fiddling while Rome is being raped. It’s possible that the UDP is not getting enough pressure. The same thing might have happened with the 1998 PUP. I will give my two cents on that at the end of this piece.              
 
Turning the finger back on the one who points, these PUP faithful need to understand that it is very difficult for people to forget their recent past. It might not be the best comparison, but sixty years after WWII, Hitler is still selling comics by the thousands, and making movies. No, the stories about the PUP ’98 to ’08 have not yet earned rest. The vote is in, but enquiring minds still want to know if all the stories Mr. Ambrose Tillett and Mr. John Avery told us (about Mahogany Heights, Intelco, Monopoly Bus, UHS, and all those other bloated projects) were absolute truth…that they were ALL retirement packages for the boys.
 
At the end of the day this nation might have to settle with Mr. Ashcroft, in cash or kind, for the UHS fiasco. The people have a right to know if this matter is on behalf of the Belizean people, or for a bunch of PUP favorites.
 
It seems that the PUP position on that particular debt is that they prostrated themselves to Venezuela to get the UHS debt squared, so whichever way the game played, the end is that it is no sweat off our brow. That might hold water if we so choose it to be so, but it does not explain what really gaan down.
 
Another big hurdle for the opposition party that is interested in forming the next government (the VIP have a thirty-year projection. Or is it fifty?), is that they selfishly held on to power long after our romance with the blue was over. They didn’t exceed five years but their version of mek dem wait was much longer. The people were so grateful to dump the UDP burden in ’98 they coddled the PUP all the way into 2003. Hn, it might be ditto for the UDP until 2013.
 
 
A little Kriol 101 for
Mr. Uh Luna
 
The first thing people in other ethnic groups who want to understand about us need to know, is that there are immediate members in every Kriol family who can wash in other ethnic groups. Heck, when I was growing up I had Chinese cousins living a few houses from where I lived. But one half of my cousins had no blood connections to my Chinese brothers. Some Kriols have had problems with the Garinagu, and some Kriols have had issues with the Mestizo, and so on and so forth. But to say (as the history books suggest) that the Kriols as a group hated this one, or that one, is false.
 
One surprising thing I found out when I left Belize City/Belmopan as a young man, and went to live and work in rural areas, is that while there is no ethnic divide between city and country Kriols, they were “suspicious” of “us.” And, that ethnicity was far more of an issue with them.
 
Mr. Uh Luna has had a free run these past few weeks. Aha, I am waiting for the Battle of St. George’s Caye champion announced by the Amandala to ride in. You bet I’ll be on the ehm front row, cheering her/him on as s/he pummels the stuffings out of Mr. Uh Luna’s “difficulty” with the Kriols’ glorious past.
 
 
Crook’s choice 
There’s a Charlie Chavannes cartoon in a fairly recent edition of the Reporter that the new Commissioner of Police ought to see. You remember the one with the police officer hollering out his lungs, pleading for someone to show him where the criminal, who is standing right in front of him, is? That is so very real. Yes, in a small country like Belize it is so easy to know all that you need to know. In a village the first call is to the Chairman. The next call is to the Village Chairman’s main rival. There, you got the picture.
 
I think all citizens who try to live within the laws wish the new Commissioner well on his posting. Everyone I have spoken to says the man is very brave. I can see where a fearless nature would appeal to the PM, because he’s a pretty brave guy too. They tell me that the new Commissioner is fundamentally honest. That trait would endear him to the new PM also. (Hey, our last PM was honest too…but he got himself into trouble because he wanted to be all things to all men. Then he had to start covering up. Oh, the last Commissioner seemed okay enough to me too.)
 
Based solely on television footage I saw on Channel Five and Channel Seven, I can’t say I liked Mr. Jeffries’ style in handling crowds riled up by perceived bad governance. He reminded me of the guy who, on seeing a stalemate fight, puts a “bom” between the two protagonists, knocks it out, and pushes them together.
 
The one-year contract for a Police Commissioner is a brilliant stroke. Make a difference, or find your pasture. A brave man will respond to such a challenge.
 
 
Put on the gloves now
 
On his Belize Exposure Show (KREM TV, Sunday nights) last Sunday, Hon. Sedi Elrington said that there is a crisis of discipline, education, and patriotism. He said that our youths need serious help with their behavior, that school holidays are too long, and that all our youths in school should march on the 10th and on the 21st. His guest on the show, a former government educator named Mr. Coleman (Basil?), said that there are too many teachers in the system that are there only for 15th and ending, and that there is a crisis of creativity in the classroom.
 
H. Elrington said that it is urgent that we reverse the trend. He said that he has tried to light a fire under the backsides (my version of what he said) of the church leaders who control our education system. But they appear not to grasp that the system is failing our children. Terribly.
 
 
A wee correction 
Hey, the third line of the article, Our emperor’s expensive suit (last Friday’s piece), should have read…”I believe that anybody who spends a whopping $250 for new clothes needs to get the old cranium checked”… NOT $250 grand as appeared in the story.
  
Ha, to city folk that sentence might have seemed totally unreal…but there are thousands of Belizeans, especially rural stock (include me) who have never put on clothes, and footwear, which in total sniffs anywhere near 250 dollars. That’s our real out here in the countryside.
 
The way this clothes thing works, if you love it you buy the best you can afford… $25…$250…$25,000…$25,000,000, whatever. Things that seem extravagant help make the wheels in this economic system turn. If you got the money and that’s how you get your kicks, well, that’s the damned capitalism.

Check out our other content

World Down Syndrome Day

Suicide on the rise!

Check out other tags:

International