“We have met the enemy, and he is us.” ~ Commodore Perry
During the war of 1812, Admiral Perry wrote to Admiral Harrison, mouthing the exact words. Over 150 years later. Cartoonist Walt Kelly modified Commodore Perry’s famous words when he created a poster for the first Earth Day to highlight that man was his own worst enemy.
Essayist and philosopher George Santayana famously said, “he who does not learn from history is doomed to repeat the past mistakes.” In his book Breaking the Cycle, Charles Wilkin QC says of democracy that “it requires open and accountable governance and that the people be properly informed on what the government is doing in their name.”
He continues, “it requires that the people be conscious of their rights and of the obligations of those whom they elect: that they speak out about abuses of power and against secretive behavior of their leaders: “Democracy”, he said, “should never be taken for granted.”
Being a part of the Commonwealth, one would think that we in Anguilla would adhere to a set of principles embedded in our constitution, but regretfully, that is not the case. It hasn’t been the case since the inception of ministerial government some forty years ago. Since that time, Anguilla has been governed by the same twenty-five guys who, at best, hadn’t a clue what the devil they were doing. Be that as it may, we still find ourselves the unwitting participants of a conspiracy of governments who were and are ill-equipped to lead us.
We see our government passing laws that defy logic. We see our government doing things that force one to ask, are these the same guys who begged and pleaded for our vote just a little over a year and a half ago? The same guys who were going to bring change. The same guys who had nothing written down, yet they made promises that have since fallen by the wayside.
To be fair, it is not just this government. All our governments were elected on different promises, and the results have always been the same. They get in there, and suddenly, reality sets in. They can’t deliver on their grandiose promises. They start worrying about the next election. They got elected on false promises – they knowingly lied to get elected. What’s more egregious is that they then proceed to be willing sycophants to just about anyone who comes along. They haven’t one original idea that will benefit the people.
It is the job of a government, any government, to do for the people what they can’t do for themselves – provide and maintain infrastructure, provide for the safety of its people, and have a surplus so that in the event of a major disaster, there’s that rainy day fund that you could tap into. It is also the government’s job to seek out and provide opportunities for its people to stay at home and contribute to the progress of their territory.
Anguilla, in which I grew up, the Anguilla that everyone seems to have forgotten, we were taught by our parents “not to hang our hat higher than our hand can reach”. You did not buy that refrigerator before you could afford it. When you built your home, you did so, not with money you borrowed from a bank, but money earned from your blood, sweat, and tears. You built it in stages as you could afford it. When the house was finished, you didn’t have to go out and burn any papers, as is the custom. It is yours when the home is finished, lock stock and barrel.
All of what we, the so-called baby boomers, have long since jettisoned, all that we were taught, the proverbial “don’t hang your hat higher than your hand can reach,” has given way to borrow, borrow, borrow. It is a well-known fact that one of our former Chief Ministers, also the Chairman of the Board at one of our indigenous banks, encouraged his constituents to borrow money, and borrow money they did, whether or not they had the wherewithal to pay it back.
The Anguilla of yesteryear, like the Edsel and the dodo bird, no longer exists. Today, we have the Anguilla of 30-year mortgages, cell phone towers, overpriced electricity, a highly suspicious water system, and the outsourcing of our government.
This piece is entitled “the enemy within.” And given the way things are going in Anguilla, anyone looking on would have no choice but to conclude that we have met the enemy, and he is us. History is rife with examples of black people eating their own. In Anguilla, we will give our very own a hard time while at the same time rolling out the red carpet for foreigners. I am not a xenophobe opposed to foreign investors; I want the same concessions for local businesses. We will tax the local businessman into submission while giving everyone else privileges denied to us. We will force our native sons to seek relief elsewhere. How did we get here?
We, the people, are forced to pay taxes to keep the government afloat so that those who come in to do business with us are free to do as they please. Our government is more than willing to consent to these developers who know we are hungry to get something done. We treat our own as though they are the lepers – we want nothing to do with them. We allowed our government to destroy our wealth by destroying our two indigenous banks.
One of our governments brought the Central Bank to catch the “big boys.” Eventually, our government was entangled in its trap and, consequently, ensnared the rest of us. With the bank’s demise, we lost our wealth. For most of us, it’s too late to start over. We will continue to hear that we made an investment, and as investments go, sometimes they’re good and sometimes not good. So, what does this say about the qualifications of our leaders, those to whom we’ve entrusted our wealth?
