Looking for clear answers from above

THE EDITOR: After two terms in government, Kamla Persad-Bissessar is seeking the nomination of her party and a chance for another term in office. If she wins, her party would have lost the opportunity to elect someone with a different approach to governance.

In a democracy, the people ultimately determine who is elected into office and as Persad-Bissessar has indicated in the past, she subscribes to the saying that the voice of the people is the voice of God.

As I write, I am a few thousand feet in the air on a flight. Up here it always seems that God is nearer, perhaps because we tend to see God as above in the sky. And so, I ask God, what are You saying?

Is the voice of God in support of limiting our choices of leaders to those who have proven that they just don’t understand what is possible if our people unite in rebuilding our land?

Is the voice of God saying that it is OK for just over one million people, living on an island 70 miles by 40 miles, to go through over $600,000 billion in a ten-year period and not have a reliable water supply and with such an abundance of water that the land is saturated?

Is the voice of God saying that a few criminals must hold the population in a state of fear as the Judiciary and protective services cower to the point that some are seeking asylum from a foreign country? What is the voice of God saying to us? I ask this as I feel that up here, uninterrupted by the contaminants of Earth, I may hear something to inspire us, to offer us hope.

Could God be saying to a people who boast of producing sportsmen and women among the best in the world, a people whose literature has gained international notoriety, and whose women have been adjudged the most beautiful in the world, that you do not need any messiah politician, you just need each other?

Could God be calling on us to cast off our burdensome clothing of red and yellow and put on the garment of red, white and black and together rescue our land from the few who see their hold on power as a divine right?

If God were to speak to us, would He be saying that in a land blessed with human and monetary wealth we can transform our rock of despair to a place where the water flows for all?

Is He saying together we can have communities where our children play safely knowing that their future is in good hands, all because we dared to trust the good in us and not the politicians who hold on to power by dividing us?

Up here where things are much clearer, He seems to be saying that we can only make it if we come together as one people, one nation. That requires us to take a new path, one where we take charge of our own destiny. That requires us to start by saying bye-bye to the red and yellow divisiveness, the leaders and their culture of divide and rule. It seems like the only answer.

All our challenges may be addressed with greater efficiency if we find the strength to unite. Alternatively, hopelessness reigns.

STEVE ALVAREZ via email