Labour betrayed by an 'Independent Judas'

As someone who is keenly interested in the labour movement, for the life of me I cannot understand how a man like Michael Annisette could be President of NATUC. Ever his appointment as an ‘Independent Senator’ Mr. Annisette’s credibility has been persistently questioned by various parties as he performs his duties in this country’s senate not as an Independent senator but as a perceived PNM Senator! As someone who is supposed to be the ‘voice of labour’ in the senate Mr. Annisette has done nothing to suggest that he is a representative of the working class, on the contrary he has been pro-government 99% of his sitting time.

How can the President of NATUC openly criticise a member union for legitimately defending the rights of workers? Mr. Annisette was quoted in the Daily Express as saying “nobody can be against the upgrading of a state institution. We need to modernise the system if we are to attain first world status”. Well I’ll be damned if Michael’s words weren’t pulled in verbatim from the PNM’s manifesto of ‘Vision 2020’! Funny how Mr. Annisette didn’t give any evidence of knowing what was wrong with the system to begin with, but I will give him a hint. The problem started and stems from the inefficient, mediocre corrupt managers of the system, i.e. the government of Trinidad and Tobago.

Therefore Mr. Annisette seems to not know what he speaks of because if an organisation is corrupt and inefficient and a management team presides over such organisation for decades then simply changing the workforce is not going to help because you will also need to revamp, modernise and purge the managers of the corrupt system which Mr. Anisette claims needs modernising. And to demonstrate how much I agree with him I suggest we begin revamping this management team by first having President George Maxwell Richards revoke the appointment of Independent ‘PNM’ Senator Mr. Michael Annissette!

If Mr. Annisette is so concerned about the manner in which the Government of Trinidad and Tobago is going about in treating the public servants of this country why doesn’t he as an Independent Senator and Labour Representative go into the Senate and demand that this anti-worker PNM government treat with workers in this country with dignity just as how it is done in the countries with ‘first world status’ such as Canada? When the Canadian government undertook a similar project with its tax bodies not only did it rehire the staff, staff were given a two year employment guarantee, their union was granted automatic successor ship and only two officials of the new body are appointed by the government. The other members are appointed by independent bodies and by independent bodies I mean “independent,” not independent where the Prime Minister has a veto over who is appointed!

Mr. Annisette’s talk about ‘first world status’ and the need for a ‘roundtable approach’ is nothing but hogwash when one compares it to the archaic, dogmatic manner in which this PNM government is treating with the employees of Customs and BIR. Retrenching workers (now euphemistically referred to as VSEP), attempting to derail the PSA by not granting it successor ship and creating a tax collecting special purpose company controlled by the ruling party outside the oversight of Parliament is not ‘first world status’! That is taking us back to the Stone Age! Just look at what is happening with special purpose companies like UDECOTT using state funds to sabotage a Commission of Enquiry and big honchos in UDECOTT awarding contracts to their families in Malaysia. Not surprisingly this same ‘Independent PNM Senator’ is also a director of UDECOTT. Well as the saying goes if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then guess what, it’s a duck! At least this sort of financial espionage and nepotism was contained to a much greater extent under the watchful eyes of the now maligned service commissions!

It is no wonder then why the labour movement in this country is not only perceived as weak, politically tainted and manipulated by politics when you have the President of the National Trade Union Centre treating lightly with a politically violent and blatant attack on workers’ rights and in the same vein heaping scorn upon the leader of the PSA who is going all out to preserve the dignity of his union’s members. If the labour movement in this country does not soon wake up and remove forthwith the obvious Judas who is also working part time as the anti-Christ in our senate and strip him from the Presidency of NATUC, an organisation whose interests he clearly isn’t serving then there is no point saying we have a labour movement in this country. Labour in Trinidad and Tobago is dead! ©

Dying Celebrities and Lying ID Cards

It’s a strange thing, the way people over the age of 45 say to me “Buh you young”. With the understanding of time and relativity I know what they are saying is true, yet there is something slowly etching away at the comfort of my youth. I was really shocked by the death of Michael Jackson not only because of the realisation that the King of Pop is actually no more but by the revelation that he was 50 years old! It is strange how until his death it never occurred to me that Michael was twice my age, his age was something I seldom thought about. As a matter of fact it is only until his death that I actually acknowledged that many of his songs that I liked were released the year I was born 1982 and some of them shortly thereafter.

I grew up on Michael’s music and it is only in the year 2009 that I realised I had a false perception MJ and I was of the same era, heck we were separated by two decades and a half! Then there was the death of David Carradine famous for his role as Cain in the TV series Kung Fu the legend, one of my favourite all time childhood TV shows. Cain I knew for certain was older than I am I had no illusions of sharing an era with him, however his death still had an impact on me because it reminded me of my childhood with such clarity. It’s amazing how the death of a celebrity can really jolt you back into reality and it is not because they were famous and are celebrities. The world of celebrities is like a timeline for us average mortals. Your celebrity fan affiliation is a signature of the era you belong or belonged to and it can scare the living day lights out of you if pondered upon too seriously.

Watching the 2009 BET awards I had a surreal feeling watching Tevin Campbell sing his 1993 hit ‘Can we talk’. This was still the time where the women in a young male’s music video were still fully clothed. I consider myself to be more in Kevin’s era, him turning 31 years old this year just 4 years older than I am. The feeling was surreal because Kevin was no longer the smooth face pretty young black man in his video ‘Can we talk’ and after not seeing him for such a long time it was so strange to watch this man with grey hair setting in, sing his 1993 hit song on the BET Awards. He is still good looking, but after not seeing him for such a long time the difference in his appearance was markedly different. I wonder if people who know me and who are about 4 years younger than I am who may not have seen me for a while, if they see me now would my changed features stand out to them the way Kevin’s stood out to me? And how much grey hair will I have in the next four years?

In the environment I work, the perusal of people’s ID cards is a necessity. Lately I’ve found myself paying greater attention to the year persons were born and observing their features. You’re able to make a better comparison with those who have IDs that are soon to expire because our ID cards are valid for 10 years so you actually get to observe the marked changes of the person’s features over the period of a decade. My ID card is due to expire next year and I’m of the view that ID cards are one of the most dishonest inanimate things to exist on this planet. You give them your youthful beauty via a photo and in later years they lie to you. They list your date of birth and state your name, they claim that the person in the photo is you but every time you look in the mirror you know your ID card is a liar. After you grant them your youthful beauty they flaunt your youth in your face.

As I write this I acknowledge that there are certain parts of my body that are starting to ache, it’s an aching that I’m not accustomed too but I’m sure I will become familiar. It’s strange but seven years ago I don’t recall having a single ache, not unless I bounce my toe or fell real hard while playing football. As I watch school boys in their prime pass me by in the street I feel a tinge of jealousy creeping into my psyche, a jealousy I never knew existed. I suppose it’s the type of jealousy my girlfriend has often explained to me that she has noticed in the eyes of women older than her while observing her and of late my girlfriend has been wondering if she would have that same distant gaze while observing younger girls.

I noticed that her interest in anti-aging creams has suddenly peaked within the last couple months. Being one year older than I am and a woman at that, my girlfriend makes more observations and comments about her body than I do of mine. Two weeks ago she went into Pennywise and while perusing the various brands of anti-aging creams one of the ‘just out school sales clerks’ asked her how old she was and she said she just stared at the girl, she couldn’t answer off the bat. Determined to make a sale the sales clerk indicated to her that once she reaches the age of 30 she should start using the anti-aging cream.

That comment was a grave injustice to me, the unknown boyfriend! Sales clerks ought to be more sensitive to the unknown and unseen boyfriends. We are usually the ones who are left with the challenging task of assuaging our women’s distress of growing old! Another new trend I noticed lately is being asked ‘Will you still love me when I get old”? How does a man answer a question like that but in the affirmative? And how are we to sound sincere every time the question is asked? I don’t know the answer, all I know is some kind of male survival mechanism usually kicks in and I am able to endure the repeated questions and conversations of growing old and for that I thank the natural laws of evolution.

It’s a funny thing how between the ages of 14 and 20 you usually feel as if your life is at a standstill. You yearn for your ‘independence’ and it seems as if adulthood is taking forever to come knocking at your door. August holidays usually feel as if they are a year and the next birthday seems like two years away. Between the ages of 20-25 you enter into a phase of existing but not truly existing as your life takes on a transformation that is most certainly irreversible. Your allowance is replaced by a salary and your home work is replaced by industrial work. Your snack and mall indulgences are replaced by bills, real hardcore never ending bills and control battles with your parents are replaced by emotional battles with your significant other.

By the time you reach 25 your life goes into high gear. The years cease to appear as long and your clock begins to count down. Pretty soon you begin to notice that in the next couple years you will be 30 and the years keep getting shorter and concluding much more quickly. You start to notice the many changes in the world and it amazes you how so many things change and in so little time. The phrase “We are all here only for a time” becomes much more meaningful as we live out and observe the transformations take place during ‘our time’, transformations both internal and external. We solemnly trot along our time lines and embrace all that come our way and the false belief that we control everything in our lives suffices if only to maintain our sanity while another celebrity of our youthful days passes away and an ID renewal is no longer an indication of independence and a new beginning as when we first acquired it. Instead it is now a sign of imminent conclusion, a conclusion we may not be looking forward to but a conclusion that is certain to come nonetheless. ©