indepen-dance

as we celebrate emancipation in the face of modern-day slavery, so we must ask on our 49th anniversary of independence, under a state of emergency and curfew: is trinidad+tobago truly independent? before we can even bemoan what local radio programming tells us of our national culture, we must start by asking: can a nation consider itself independent if it cannot or does not feed itself? can a place be independent if its priority is producing for somebody else, and its concerns of people who do not live there? should we believe ourselves emancipated from mental slavery when we needlessly sweat while we sweat, dressed in the suits of our colonisers, denying the daily reality of where we exist now? is any people independent when common sense and the national good are not applied to questions of social responsibility, and administrative accountability is nil?

independence: freedom from dependence on or control by another person, organisation or state; freedom from the influence or determination of another or others; an income sufficient for a livelihood.
is independence the true state of the nation?
ask yourself if our agriculture and related food production industries+standards are what they should be for an independent nation of our resources+capabilities. ask if our health+education institutions+standards are what they should be for an independent nation of our resources+potential? ask [simply]: are we self-sufficient?
instead of regional cooperation, we of the caribbean “independently” grovel at the feet of the so-called 1st world, giving them preferential treatment to our own disadvantage. our people and natural resources are put in harm’s way to fatten the pockets of the few we have given the power to put their own financial independence above the nation’s. we prostitute our culture, cheapening it for foreign dollars to feed the wine+jam mentality that is increasingly all we have to offer.
the value of this nation is in its people, underfed+underemployed, potential underresourced+undersupported, creativity squeezed into ever-tighter mental boxes to fit in the mainstream…is trinidad+tobago an independent nation, or a group of people dependent on individuals independent of conscience, concern and responsibility toward those who gave them authority? we the people don't even have the run of our own homeland as we commemorate this date in our history, our civil liberties dependent on those seemingly independent of rational reasoning about how to solve the problems we face in this country.
the battle for true independence is not yet won. we must be ourselves for ourselves, develop our resources to our own benefit, to take care of ourselves weself, become self-sustaining, an independent nation not only in title but in action and in the daily reality of all her people.
with freedom comes responsibility and we must all take responsibility for our independence.
walk good.