THE EDITOR:
IT is quite unbearable.

Within a two-week period I was shocked at the steep rise in prices of food stuff which I purchase at the Chaguanas market.

I have been “making market: at the Chaguanas market for 25 years.

On July 29 I purchased my regular items; on August 12 I was taken aback at the prices of some of these same items.

During this two-week period the price of cabbage moved from $2.50 to $6-7 per lb; baighan from $1.50/$2 to $5 per lb; sweetpepper from $5 per lb to $12 per lb.

For some reason christophene has been quite high.

Usually, $2 can purchase a large one; now it is selling at $12 per lb.

The price of tomato has remained very high, selling for between $7 to $12 per lb according to size.

This is reminiscent of the last boom period.

Potato which I purchased for just $1.50 per lb on July 29 sold for $3 per lb.

One can go on and on.

An indication of the inflationary spiral is reflected in the price of the favourite “doubles”.

Within a short period of time the price escalated from the established $1 to $1.50 to $2.

There is an inflationary psychology at present.

There is no bad weather like flooding when prices of foodstuff rise; the festivals of Divali/Eid/Christmas and New Year are some months off.

There is price fixing among vendors at the Chaguanas Market.

I have witnessed one vendor passing around and telling other vendors at what price to sell items.

They all stick to pre-arranged prices -- there is the absence of competition.

Now an inflationary psychology is added.

The responsibility for this has to do with the government expenditure.

This more than other factor is responsible for the situation.

These prices are the same one experienced during the last boom period (1973-1983).

History is repeating itself.

We seem to have learnt nothing from our past experience.

Now it is being suggested that trade unions must refrain from making demands for wage increases consistent with the price of foodstuff and inflation.

We are in a vicious cycle.

Clearly, the government must curtail its expenditure to bring some kind of control over inflation.

THE EDITOR:
RECENTLY in addressing a United National Congress (UNC) meeting, Trevor Sudama called upon Winston Dookeran to “look at the larger picture” to resolve his differences with the party.

I have been pondering this statement for some time and it has bothered me.

I am concerned that no one responded to Sudama to set him straight.

Sudama’s larger picture is, of course, a situation in which Panday is the boss.

I wish to tell Sudama that the picture he see is, without a doubt, the smaller picture.

What Dookeran is doing is taking our politics forward.

Panday’s politics and that of the present executive of the UNC has always been “we” versus “them”.

Politics under Panday has been nothing more than identifying with the enemy.

I squirm whenever I remember Panday’s statement at the big meeting at Mid-Centre Mall that the many seminars and con-ferences Dookeran was holding on various social topics were nothing more than “intellectual masturbation”.

I have lived in the Couva area for many years which is represented by Kelvin Ramnath and Basdeo Panday and not one of these representa-tives has ever organised an intellectual conference, seminar or sym-posium on any social topics, whether agriculture, Social Services, land issues or any other issue for the education and benefit of their constituents.

It is in this sense that I see Winston Dookeran’s politics as the bigger picture.

THE EDITOR:
IT almost makes life worth living again, even in a crime ridden, inflation impacted, smelter menaced T&T, even though still blighted by the miasma of incompetence, nepotism and corruption of a failed political directorate. For the first time since Robinson sold this nation for an enhanced retirement package, a light is visible at tunnel’s end.

Just when it appeared inevitable that only fire and bloodshed could purge the multitude of sins committed since democracy was usurped by morality, spirituality and the rule of law, those prostituted sentiments promise to resume pre-Robinson distortions.

Thanks to the influence of the hero of our World Cup Warriors, a fractured and frightened society is regaining hope -- a refreshing relief, after five years of unmitigated disaster.

Winston Dookeran, with modesty, honesty, courage and quiet perseverance has shown us all that if we watch, look, listen and support and embrace his refreshing patience, integrity and tenacity, as he takes the fight to the People’s National Movement (PNM), we may yet be saved by the ballot rather than the bullet.

Greater the tragedy, therefore, that his original patron, Jack Warner, fails yet, to recognise the full extent of his own achievement!

While initially, not alone in agonising over the decision to ensure Dookeran’s contested title, Jack, Kamla and Rudi, as the only three capable and untainted members of the Panday faction, need shield their ears from the Silver Fox’s mesmerising rhetoric, and listen instead to their common sense and political instincts.

Unless they do so urgently they will find themselves more constructively and honestly involved, as back up singers in Cro Cro’s latest assault upon their master.

A United National Congress (UNC), which since it’s removal on December 24, 2001 has, with too few exceptions, done nothing but retreat, rather than attack, before Manning and his minions, only to degenerate into the obscenity of internecine strife, cannot seriously consider itself a viable opposition, far less the “government in waiting” which the situation demands.

When to the foregoing is added the effrontery of seeking to disassociate and denigrate the only voice of political sanity heard in this country, since the electoral campaign of 2000, they are reduced in public perception to less than Manning and his failed minions.

It is pertinent to remind those three that, in politics, as in nothing else, popular perception is every thing and popular perception, is not that expressed by well engineered mobs demanding Dookeran’s expulsion. That display may most charitably be described as a compulsion to mass political suicide, worthy only of Jim Jones cultists in Guyana.

That level of partisan instigation is, in case it escaped their attention, the most valid contribution to Dookeran’s mass appeal outside of the now idle acres of Caroni.

This fact, apparently, only just occurred to the Silver Fox.

Further, before Panday temporarily bridged the ethnic divide (this was, of course, before Ramesh destroyed his integrity and credibility), Indo-Trinidad had never single handedly won a general election!

Hence Panday’s recent agitation and emotion in his belated determination to halt Dookeran’ expulsion.

If Dookeran might be accused of one political mistake to date, it is his insistence on pursuing the fiction of a viable and unifiable UNC!

Unless therefore, the afore named make urgent accommodations with today’s political realities, they court political annihilation, crushed beneath the Dookeran juggernaut as it gains momentum, or scrambling for cover, in the vicious crossfire twixt yesteryear’s and today’s political mindsets. In the coming conflict, there will be no prisoners taken by either side. Those therefore, not previously in direct contact with and support of, our next PM, can only be viewed as the enemy and dealt with accordingly.

In light whereof those already named would be well advised to move early and avoid the rush, as the battle lines are firmly established for the mind and heart of T&T.

It will be a bruising three way battle, one in which the Panday UNC is already self defeated! .

THE EDITOR:
WINSTON DOOKERAN has squandered his best chances of becoming prime minister.

And the people of Trinidad and Tobago would do themselves a great service if they start opening their eyes and seeing beyond the rhetoric and the expensive public relations.

Dookeran is without a doubt a brilliant economist.

In the Robinson government and later as governor of the Central Bank he developed fiscal policies that have kept Trinidad and Tobago economically strong.

But he is an ineffective politician, who unfortunately has been hijacked by a group of people who are fooled by their own propaganda.

Dookeran must credit Basdeo Panday with all his political successes, so it’s idiotic for him to suggest that he doesn’t need Panday to be his saviour.

It was Panday who give him political life in Chaguanas. And when Robinson kicked out Panday and his “upstart” ULF bunch, the ULF representative from Chaguanas remained with Robinson.

He did it because he felt he had a moral obligation to help maintain stability in the country.

Neemakharam? Perhaps.

So he didn’t need Panday.

What happened next?

The same people who gave him one of the largest majorities any MP had ever seen, rejected him.

In spite of that Panday brought him back as Governor of the Central Bank, restoring his dignity.

Then in 2002, Panday engineered Dookeran’s political resurrection by giving him the St. Augustine seat, one of the safest in the country.

And for the icing on the cake, Panday gave Dookeran the leadership of the party, instructing everyone else to stay clear of challenging Dookeran for the top job.

Even today, Panday is swimming against the tide of popular opinion within the party’s rank and file and holding out for Dookeran to see the light.

But the man who wants to be prime minister is refusing to see logic and good sense in what is really happening. If, as he says, the United National Congress (UNC) membership has lost respect for him, then he must ask himself why.

Respect is earned, not bestowed.

So if people lose respect for you, it’s primarily because you gave them cause.

Now he says he’s aiming for the third constituency.

That constituency exists in every political system and has always been the weakest link in the political system. In Trinidad and Tobago people’s political affiliations are institutionalised.

And to suggest -- even remotely -- that you can achieve political success by ignoring the base of the party that gave you political life is naïve, or to be truly frank, downright stupid.

Anyone who wants to win an election must embrace all the people.

Dookeran has failed to do that.

He has caused division and shown scant concern for the people.

The question is this: why has Dookeran failed to form a new political party?

There is a simple answer. He and his cronies know that they need the UNC’s base and are afraid to make the bold move.

Panday, in spite of the demonisation by the People’s National Movement (PNM) and others, remains a leader who can command support within that “other” constituency, which Dookeran is ignoring to his peril.

Any third force as envisaged by Dookeran and his propagandists will lead to the political graveyard to join others like Tapia, Robinson’s DAC and most recently, Team Unity.

Trinidad and Tobago is crying for leadership.

Patrick Manning and his PNM have created the ideal opportunity for a united opposition to win power on behalf of the people and restore decency, dignity, morality and fiscal responsibility and security to the nation.

If Dookeran truly cares about Trinidad and Tobago as he professes, he should discard the propaganda and focus on mending fences and uniting all the forces opposed to the present administration.

That is the only road that leads to Whitehall.

He should remember that with nearly 300,000 votes the UNC still sits in opposition.

If he has lost the respect (read support) of many of those voters, can he be serious about winning an election?

But perhaps he knows best what he’s doing.

Perhaps he is on focus.

Perhaps his agenda is not to win, but to cause the PNM to win a constitutional majority and stay in office for the next decade or two.

Who knows?

The ball is in your court Dooks.

Now is the time to stand up and fight, not duck and run.

THE EDITOR:
A LOT of people have made their feelings public on the chances of a third party being successful in the next general elections.

They say that there is no chance or place for a third party and that it will simply not win.

I used to think that and in fact, there could have been no greater supporter of Basdeo Panday than me.

Today, however, things have changed.

The thinking has changed and even the voting patterns are set to change. Just like when the ULF replaced the DLP and when the NAR replaced the other parties, this is the moment when yet another party must emerge to replace what is in theory, the national opposition.

The UNC as it stands now, could not win a goat race, far less a general election and I say that with as much dismay as I do hope!

That fact, together with the wide disenchantment with the People’s National Movement (PNM) can mean only one thing -- Winston Dookeran must capitalise on this moment and form a new party that is strong enough to fight the PNM and stable enough to replace the United National Congress (UNC).

I am a young voter and I am prepared to stain my finger for Winston Dookeran.

The time is now!