THE GOVERNMENT and people of Trinidad and Tobago would certainly be looking forward to an historic and most enjoyable 50th independence anniversary celebration on August 31, 2012, in stark contrast to what prevails today, as that CARICOM partner marks its 49th freedom birthday from Britain under a gloomy state of national emergency. The second country of the English-speaking Caribbean to gain its independence after Jamaica’s ( on August 6,1992), Trinidad and Tobago has had its ‘Black Power Revolution” and survived more than its fair share of political and industrial turmoil under changing governments, to remain one of the major and important members of the Caribbean Community. For all its many social and political upheavals, I cannot recall—and stand corrected—Trinidad and Tobago ever marking an independence anniversary under a state of emergency. The current emergency, instituted last week, and which will be a matter for parliamentary debate on Friday, Sept 2, for both an extension beyond September 5 as well as a variation in the curfew periods, is generally recognised as resulting directly from the government’s “war” against the frightening scale of gun-related killings and a general criminal rampage that includes narco-trafficking and armed robberies. Normally, as have been the experiences here and elsewhere, states of emergency are associated with party politics and social and industrial unrest. No enlightened and legitimate government in a multi-party parliamentary democracy would be anxious to govern under emergency laws, aware of the negative domestic and international consequences.
Yet, there are some trade union leaders who have ascribed political motives on the part of Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar administration’s decision to make use of the “war on criminality” in order to undermine the militancy of organized labour in an ongoing dispute over an across-the-board five percent hike for public sector workers.
The government has scoffed at such a claim. For its part, the unions and their leaders are yet to connect the dots with specific details in support of their contention.                     
Keith Rowley’s main opposition People’s National Movement (PNM)—which has a dozen seats to the “partnership” government’s 29 in the 41-member House of Representatives—can be expected to do what opposition parties normally do, make politics over the state of emergency—the parliament’s debate being a good forum.
However, if some may have their own interpretations to the “peaceful two-day fast” announced on Monday by leaders of 19 trade unions, and effective from 9.am.  to 5 pm yesterday, as a symbolic opposition to the state of emergency. Then, the ebullient Mayor of  Port-of-Spain, Louis Lee Singh, lost little time in going on record with his expressed fears,  to the media, that Trinidad and Tobago was heading to become “a totalitarian state” under the present ‘People’s Partnership government of Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar.
It is doubtful that a 14-year old teenager, linked to an obscene and threatening video against the Prime Minister on two social networking sites, as reported in the local media yesterday, could have in any way been influenced by Mayor Lee Singh’s  “fears of a totalitarian state”  in Trinidad and Tobago. The teenager has already apologised and is expected to have a face-to-face meeting with Persad-Bissessar, possibly today.
The PM herself lost no time in declaring that the 14-year-old youth “should not be punished”, and that she was anxious to meet with her.
Another surprise for those familiar with declarations and implementations of states of emergency—whether resulting from political turmoil/crisis or, as in the current case  in T&T, a very serious criminal threat to the society—could be the recent calls for the authorities to both list the names of people so far detained under the emergency regulations, as well as provide the reasons for so doing.
There is knowledge of cases where, under a state of emergency resulting from political/industrial relations disturbances, the names of detainees and limited explanations for their arrest have been demanded and, at times provided. It is felt that those making similar demands in the current situation in T&T of a “war on criminals”, should help the public to benefit from their own understanding. In the meanwhile, when today’s independence anniversary activities are over, and the current state of emergency is lifted in the weeks to come, imaginative planning could be intensified for the historic celebrations of Trinidad and Tobago as a “Nation at 50”, very history-making event to be celebrated some 26 days earlier by the government and people of Jamaica.