ON THE REAL JOB OF AN OPPOSTION

 

I will readily confess that I have paid little or no attention to what I will call in this post 'the Tobago fracas', so much so that when a good friend asked me whether a special majority was needed I wrongly told him 'no' that it could be passed by an ordinary or simple majority.

I have no intention of going into the 'whys and wherefores' of the proposed legislation. But (like a lot of other people) I am interested in the politics. It seems to me that Dr. Rowley has once again outmaneuvered the erstwhile leader of the Opposition and that he really couldn't care less if the legislation fails or not. If he had been really interested in passing this legislation there would and should have been a lot more consultation. The fact that there wasn't speaks volumes for the game being played.

 If I had been asked (which happens as often as snow falls in Trinidad) I would have had my first speaker make a very short speech in the parliament. He/she would have said  that the Opposition intended to give the Government enough votes to pass the legislation but was requesting that the Government go on the record as to exactly what benefits the COUNTRY would get. In other words, was the legislation narrow in that only Tobago would benefit or was it broad enough so that the entire country would benefit? Then if or when things go wrong we will know who to blame. 

Then my speaker would have sat down and I would have asked no one else on my side to speak.

You see, we suffer a problem in this little country of ours when we refer to the Opposition as 'the opposition'. Everybody assumes that the real job of the Opposition is to oppose anything and everything that the Government of the day brings to the Parliament. That's not the job of the Opposition at all! In fact a better (though more cumbersome) title for the Opposition might be 'the Alternative Government'.  Then we might more clearly understand that their job is to provide another alternative - a better or different way from doing whatever is being proposed. Because at the end of the day "the Opposition will have its ay, and the Government will have its way" (to quote former Speaker Hector Maclean).

Look: it is either we all want a better country for EVERYBODY or we just want a better country for a select few. But I must confess that I have a very sad feeling in the pit of my stomach that there are very few of our present Parliamentarians who I believe are there genuinely to make life better for the people. I would give anything to be wrong on this and if thereis anybody out there who can name  a current Parliamentarian that he/she feels or believes is genuinely thereto make life better for the people then I invite you genuinely to name that person or persons. As for me, well dreamer that I am, I genuinely want a better country for everybody. Doesn't look that we'll get it any time soon though.