The atmosphere was tense; if we like clichés we’d say you could cut the air with a knife, yap, that’s the best way to describe the feelings of people within and without the press conference called by FECTAB heroes Thomas Greenwood and David Almendarez on Monday morning. Congratulations to Love FM for bringing the show live to Belizeans from the Hondo to the Sarstoon, from Benque Viejo to Half Moon, from Belize City to Belizeans in London and New York. For today we’ll forget how miserably that crowd failed when their Rotary mantra was put to the test recently.
Naa, we can’t let that failure interfere with the show nor the props they earned for broadcasting it live into our living rooms. My, the show, what high drama; whether you’re for or against the causeways, you had to applaud the efforts of these bona fide Belizeans and their fight for the rights to a bigger piece of our pie. It was all so exciting, until Almendarez ditched his mask.
The Leader Emeritus of FECTAB, that bombastic Tom Greenwood, didn’t he see that when George Price got that title, he was off to his memoirs? Age hasn’t softened this man’s tone one bit. Emory King and all who followed him in the movie industry are felons for not creating a movie to feature Greenwood. What a faiya of a performance on Monday, that microphone in his right fist, his mouth spewing vitriol on all wimpy local political leaders who don’t have “Belizeans first” stamped into their DNA.
Can you imagine what life would have been like in Belize if Greenwood had beaten Barrow at the polls in Queen’s Square back in 1989, and George had eased aside his triumvirate – Godfrey, Fonseca, and Musa — and given him a run at the top? Or, better still, if the PUP had found him a safe seat so that he could have gone jaw to jaw with Barrow in the House that has been abused at times with cheap and rude talk?
Forget the substance of Monday; we are talking glitter here, and Greenwood’s star shone like a 200-watt red light on a blank house on a dark night. That strategic Greenwood, he wore a pink mask, stretching his appeal to the gentle sex. That Greenwood baan fu dis! What grip he had on our attention as he blasted appointed elements who dared to suggest that their boss’s road over water did not have a sound foundation!
Ah, David, that brother has achieved great fame for calling out anything and everything foreign-owned that is getting a slice where local companies get only crumbs. I say, he’s no slouch with a mike either, but following the not-slowing-down Greenwood was, as he admitted, a task for a giant, not a young man on the rise. That did not give him the license to unmask!
Was he expressing solidarity with Joe? Joe Bradley! I have to congratulate my big nose for choosing Albert Vaughan as my hero. I would have known from the beginning that I was choosing right if I’d known their past. You see, why I keep telling you to always get the history of people who talk a lot? Aha, over time I found out that both were musicians, and one played the mighty brass instruments, and one was just a measly drummer. You’re smart; I know you can match the man with the instrument. Any upstart can beat a bass drum.
Joe, mask in hand, was seen slugging a beer and probably talking rot about the government to a couple friends. Give him his due: on his show he has done so well making the right talk and setting the best example with mask-wearing there.
My, bad Joe—this nice lady officer, in the sweetest voice, with the most pleasant words an authority figure can use, cautioned him about his flagrant public drinking, and instead of doing the mea culpa, can you believe the daam Joe taak bak? Why bwai, why? If a lady asks you to jump, you ask, how high Miss, and is there anything else you’d like me to do?
I bet not even a high-powered lawyer combo of OJ and Panton will be able to save his butt for talking back to the lady. I wager too that Darrell will not get his nose dirty defending his pa’s unruliness.
Aaayayai, Almendarez doffed his mask! And Greenwood, he recoiled and recoiled, his old frame trying to pull his breathing apparatus as far from the air assault of his young president as his chair would allow. What a hell if Greenwood’s body was acting anywhere near its physical age. But you know why that gentleman has such a firm back? It’s the soft life of a peace-time soldier who retired to a niche in the world of the literati, talk. No farmer or fisherman his age stands up so straight.
That bombastic bohga, if he had known the physical pain of a laborer it would have caught up to him already, and he would have crashed to the floor, from off his chair, in his strenuous efforts to protect his precious air, after, after Mr. Almendarez, like Joe, took off his mask.
My brother’s keeper
Aha, it turns out that the MOHW was really about locking out unvaccinated individuals from the church building, and I know that for a fact after reading the Dayne Guy story, “NEAB blindsided by SI 119”, in the Tuesday Amandala. In that story Pastor Lance Lewis of the NEAB cried foul against the government for introducing the vax mandate after they had met and discussed the reopening of churches and there was no mention that the faithful would need to be vaxxed.
Mr. Lewis said big heat was being brought on the NEAB by some church members, when the fact is that “the Prime Minister, Hon. John Briceño, failed to inform them of a vital stipulation — that only immunized persons would be allowed inside the churches.” Agh, some of the heat brought by members of NEAB came from those who believe “that the vaccine mandate goes against the spirit of Christianity.”
There were other difficulties with the vax requirement that the church leader said were being mentioned by the flock, but that Devil thing — I think the NEAB’s leaders have to check if they are being true to the call that we be our brothers’ keepers when they give a pass to members who suggest that the vax is from the one with the fork. Sir, no, that’s not a reasonable defense by the NEAB to resist the SI.
Everyone knows that the vax will improve in efficacy and safety as time goes along, and, no surprise, there are people waiting until that better vax comes along. There are people with fragile health who naturally are fearful of taking a vax that makes one feel ill. There are people who think the WHO is being run by Nazis. What we have in the room are people who don’t trust the science, people who are unhealthy, and bah, people who think our doctors are up to no good.
I don’t want to be mean, but that Devil story, which is what “vaccine mandate goes against the spirit of Christianity” is, has to be called out now, in preparation for the next big one, and to help prevent the present pandemic from extending and/or getting worse. About the next big one, it’s big trouble for the world if so many people resist taking their medicine. About this pandemic extending/getting worse, that’s what many doctors say can happen if we don’t all fall into line and vax out the beast Covid.
In closing, I’m joining my prayers with the rest of the nation for a speedy recovery for Doctor Eck and all others who are ill.