Blackout illuminates our failures

PAOLO KERNAHAN

LAST WEEK Trinidad was plunged into darkness, well further darkness anyway. If there was any expectation this debacle would be managed without typical Trini bumbling and obfuscation then we need to manage our expectations.

T&TEC announced an islandwide power outage, but at the time couldn't identify the source of the problem. In the same public announcement the commission trotted out patently hollow assurances that the problem would be sorted out within two-three hours.

At the time I heard the announcement on the radio I put my own conservative estimate of six hours on top of the three T&TEC estimated. Additionally, it was apparently lost on those who hastily put together the public advisory that the commission was committing to fix a problem it hadn't pinpointed.

As word spread via spotty cell phone service, it became clear this was a serious situation. There was a picture circulating online of a certain minister buying a small generator. The inference accompanying social media posts is that this minister had inside knowledge of what was really going on with T&TEC – he got the zeppo that power wouldn't be restored any time soon.

The well-heeled and connected in society were thus forearmed with knowledge while the rest of us plebs huddled in the fading glow of cell phone screens and flickering candles. The truth is probably far less titillating – people buying generators have access to the same insights and knowledge all of us have. They simply have the resources to do something about it.

Most upper-crust enclaves in Trinidad are hemmed in by lower socio-economic communities. The one thing that can potentially shatter our utterly contrived facade of social harmony is the vulnerability of darkness.

Without the marginally effective deterrent of perimeter security lamps and cameras, many citizens are easy prey for roving bands of armed criminals for whom robbery with violence is legitimate employment. There isn't much sense begrudging the affluent their generators. We all muddle along in this place as best we can.

Apart from economic losses sustained during the prolonged outage, there was a downplayed threat to the security and safety of citizens. Acting Commissioner of Police Mc Donald Jacob says his officers were able to "mobilise quickly and operate successfully."

In addition to some reported arrests made in and around Port of Spain, Jacob curiously said officers also averted a situation which "could have developed into something very serious for Trinidad and Tobago." The acting CoP volunteered no details on this menace, nor was it apparent whether he was asked by the interviewer to elaborate. If you're surprised by that then you haven't been paying attention...to anything.

Jacob's assurances that the police were ready and active is perhaps true of the capital city (even that has been challenged). In other parts of the country I visited, however, there was not a police patrol in sight. As people fled Port of Spain in an exodus usually reserved for clockwork flooding, traffic snarled as frustrated motorists negotiated completely unmanned traffic lights.

I have seen a greater police presence on any other day when officers are doing routine revenue-raising ticket distribution activities. Several in society disputed Jacob's glowing assessment of TTPS responsiveness. In T&T, truth and reality aren't immutable but simply malleable functions of our politics.

Many Trinis were quick to minimise the blackout, citing the 2021 power outages in Texas that spanned several days. Setting aside the three winter storms that precipitated that disaster, the weaknesses of the Texas power grid are well documented and widely known. The state's flawed power distribution system is actively debated and criticised by Texans.

Hopelessly wedded to the "is not we alone" ethos, Trinis embrace failure as a universal condition rather than learning, as others do, from those mistakes

A three-man team has apparently been set up to investigate the blackout. In T&T, however, establishing a committee
is the action, not the subsequent implementation of any recommendations. File that under the covid19 economic recovery team, the committee to probe unrest in PoS in 2020 and every other hackneyed government response to crises.

Chances are the findings of that three-man theatrical diversion will never see the light of day, certainly not with our amnesiac media and public. Nor is it likely to even be exhumed when the next inevitable mass failure darkens our door.

The lengthy blackout illuminated what many of us already know – this society is woefully unprepared for any emergency. Of this and other truths about T&T many citizens are more comfortable remaining in the dark.