…about (sugar) depression
Yesterday was World Health Day – commemorated under the theme “Let’s talk” as one way to deal with depression. Your Eyewitness was struck by the studied refusal by Government officials to deal with concrete drivers of depression. And more to the point what they could do about it. The way the new Minister of Health carried on in her ad in the newspapers, you’d think she was “talking” about a problem on Mars!
For instance, how can she ignore the depression into which the closing of the Wales Sugar Estate has plunged the entire West Bank of Demerara?? Does she know what losing a job means to one person who has no transferrable skill – and in an economy that’s already in a depression? Try 1700 persons. Try the four persons in each of those 1700 families. Try the 60,000 persons the spill-off from the Wales economic input into the local economy will affect. Does she know why even humourless fellas like economists talks about an economy being in a “depression”??
It’s human beings we’re talking about. So, can we talk? Well, if a tree falls in the middle of the forest, but there’s no one there to hear the sound of the crash, did it fall? So sure, WE can talk – but not those folks from the West Bank. Have you noticed the amount of coverage the parking meter protests brought out in Georgetown? Have you noticed the VAT on education coverage in the media – in Georgetown? That’s a clue as to why Wales can’t talk – there’s no one to listen.
In any other country in the world, the news of 1700 persons thrown into the streets with no jobs in sight and no safety net to tide them over – would’ve been big news. But not when it concerns sugar workers. They are still doing slave and indentured work – so of course they don’t matter. And we return to their depression – and depression it will be.
Expect alcohol consumption to skyrocket as folks who were already socialised to “drown their sorrows” in liquor, now have sorrows multiplied a hundredfold. Expect domestic violence to explode and jobless men take out their frustrations on their spouses and their children – who still expect to eat. Expect crime to rise as those men and children use whatever means necessary to survive. Expect their depression to precipitate more suicides as those who can’t externalise their frustration take it out on themselves.
Let’s talk, all right. But not about the depression that’s washing over Wales like a tsunami.
…about the warehouse
The Minister of Health mentioned above got her job because her predecessor messed up big time on the (in) famous rental of that pharma warehouse in Albouystown. And it seems that arrangement just keeps popping up like the proverbial bad penny. Excepting, of course, it’s actually costing the nation a pretty penny! $150 million annually, to be exact!
The latest episode in the sordid tale came out of a tour the warehouse’s officials arranged for reporters. Now, as background, you have to remember the reason our Prime Minister offered when asked why a warehouse was needed in the city – when the Government already had one at Diamond. He said when the GPHC runs out of drugs, they could be rushed right over and avoid the traffic jam on the East Bank Highway. Fair enough.
Well, we now discover from the warehouse supervisor when GPHC needs drugs, she has to ship them to the Diamond warehouse and then they’re dispatched from there!!!
It’s enough to make you depressed!!
…about a fishy story
The CEO of GuySuCo said fish (tilapia to be exact) will be substituted for sugar on its lands. The 300-acre pilot hasn’t even been launched, but diversification head Tony Vieira says US$5.2 billion is expected from GuySuCo 120,000 acres!!
Counting our fingerlings before they’re hatched, eh Tony? Remember, that’s why you went bankrupt. Twice!
