The Machine Readable Passport

For some time now Trinbagonians have been making a mad dash to get the new machine readable passport. This was obviously based on an overzealous statement made in the Parliament by the Minister of National Security Senator Martin Joseph which announced that all citizens would be afforded the opportunity to obtain the new passport by December 2010. Now I think that a long standing man in the arena of politics should know his people better by now. We like new thing. So people hear that there is a new passport available and by 2010 everybody will have one. We Trinibagonians change that to you must have the passport by 2010. The information was not communicated to the public clearly by the officials. Once a passport has not reached its expiration date it is a valid travel document. It is that simple.

Currently there are more than Twenty six thousand (26,000) uncollected passports. Why we so? Obviously there are 26,000 people walking around comfortable with the fact that they clogged the system and applied for a national document that they had no use for. Mind you I am sure that there were other people who needed to travel urgently and could not be accommodated because the system could only process a certain amount of applications at a time. My passport has expired since November 2007 and exactly two years later I have made no serious attempt to obtain a new one. The main reason being, I have no money to go a damn place. Trinbagonians get on as though when they get a passport they automatically get a ticket to go somewhere. What many of us fail to realize here, is that there is a cost attached to storing those uncollected passports. Not to mention the obvious security risks involved. The next thing that is going to happen is that some innovative Trini working in the Immigration Division would realize that money could be made through some racket involving those passports. So please make an attempt to collect your passport as soon as possible.


What has been your experience with this change to the use of machine readable passports?

Criminal Deportees wreaking havoc in Trinidad and Tobago?

Criminal deportees have been a problem in the Caribbean for some time now. When the great US of A realized that a number of the persons committing crimes were non-US citizens they started to get rid of the persons by sending them right back from whence they came. Some of them would be sent back immediately, while other would be sent back after serving time in jail. The government of Trinidad and Tobago has in the past blamed the upsurge in crime on the influx of criminal deportees. I agree and disagree with this to some extent.

I agree with the theory that criminal deportees who are returned to Trinidad and Tobago do indeed contribute to the levels of crime and violence in the country. But I really think that a lot of times they are doing the only thing they know to survive. Many deportees left Trinidad and Tobago as young children with their parents. They have very little if not no memory of Trinidad and Tobago. While living in the United States they for whatever reason turn to a life of crime. Subsequent to which they get caught and are returned “home” a place they barely know. On reaching Trinidad they would be left in the airport with nothing. And when I say nothing I mean nothing. Not even toilet paper or identification. Imagine being sent to a country to live that you don’t even know, not knowing anyone and not even knowing the cardinal points to be able to move around. Obviously these people would do what they have learned and know best and that is to do whatever it takes to survive whether it be legal or illegal. I spoke to a deportee who told me that he felt like a child in a candy shop when he came back to Trinidad because things he used to do years ago as a teenager for fun Trinbagonian criminals were now doing to make serious money. Essentially he became a master and started a particular trend in T&T (So the man say eh). The government is not to be blamed solely for this because the deportees would be sent back without local law enforcement being notified so the persons could be monitored. In order for the notification to be made there needs to be a memorandum of understanding between the two countries. The sad thing is that we cannot do that. You feel if we had a US citizen in jail in Trinidad we could put him on a plane and send him back with no identification. The person would not even be able to clear immigration and customs.

On the other hand I do not think that the local criminals need influence from deportees to make “advances in criminal technology”. Essentially our law enforcement agencies are too caught up in bureaucracies that cause them to be slow to react to the ever changing environment. Plus these days the internet can be used for both good and bad. So while we law abiding citizens using Google to find school work or to impress our boss they using it to find ways to outsmart the police. Let us face it criminals are not stupid. Well most of them at least. They are just using their creative energy in the wrong way.

Recently the government, through the Ministry of Social Development introduced a procedure to meet deportees on arrival. The standard operating procedure is that a social worker from the Social Displacement Unit of the Ministry of Social Development would be at the airport to meet deportees. Upon which a social history assessment and a needs assessment would be conducted to determine the level of assistance required in order to reintegrate the deportee into society. Provision of initial accommodation is not usually a problem, as well as transportation to the accommodation site. However until the assessments are completed it cannot be said what would be provided to the deportees.

I am in no way trying to make excuses for deportees because some of them left Trinidad and Tobago as adults to go and make confusion in the people country and then get sent home and bring their nasty ways back with them. I applaud the effort of the government to implement something to deal with the deportees who return with nothing and no family to turn to. If this initiative prevents one deportee from resorting to crime to survive then for me it is a success. Do you really think that deportees have contributed significantly to crime in Trinidad and Tobago?

The Highway Car Park

For several hours per day highways in Trinidad become a car park, thousands of cars barely moving. I remember there was a time that I hated traffic. Not anymore. I have come to embrace traffic for one simple reason. On average my daily commute is FOUR hours. So I thought what can I do to stop alleviate the traffic. Not much. So I decided to just relax, because if I continued hating the traffic then I would be angry for at least four hours per day. That not making no sense. So woo saa. Although I may have come to terms with the fact that traffic has become a part of life I think that it may have debilitating effects on us as citizens that we may not immediately consider or take note of.

Traffic is physically unhealthy. Sitting in a vehicle for several hours per day could never be good for our health. I am no doctor but I know my body and I feel it, when I get out of the car all I want to do is spread out, get a good stretch. Additionally many of us leave home in the morning too early to have breakfast and then barely make it to work on time and rush to eat whatever we find and that may not be the best for our bodies. essentially don’t have a proper breakfast which is the most important meal of the day. Then there is the afternoon commute as many people are on the road until six or seven at night and would have eaten lunch sometime around midday, so we hungry so we have to indulge in the Highway Market.

Traffic could drive you to drink. How many times you get a call from a friend, “aye ah hear the traffic real bad let we go an lime nuh”. Several afternoons per week instead of going home we are in our favourite watering hole knocking back a few drinks. This may seem to be a fun going past time but it can quickly develop into a problem especially for those of us who have a history of alcoholism in our family. Not to mention the obvious fact which is the drinking is being done to kill time to drive home. Therefore drinking and driving, a deadly combination.

Traffic is not economical. Traffic encourages us to spend money that we did not intend to spend. How many people budget for their nuts, and drinks purchased on the highway on the day home. If this is a daily habit at a cost of ten dollars for the day for nuts and a beverage with an average of twenty working days for the month that is two hundred dollars. It may not seem like much until we look at the annual figure of two thousand four hundred dollars. Add to that the afternoons when we would go drinking and thanks to the budget that bill is even higher now. Then there are the phone calls that we make while driving. Many of us get on the phone to talk to friends and family as a distraction from the traffic. then at the end of the month your friendly mobile service provider buss your throat

Traffic has a negative impact on our social lives. Personally I am single partly because I spend four hours a day in traffic. Even if a see a cute guy driving alongside me I can’t flag him down because he probably vex he in traffic. Then when I reach home I too tired to go back out. On a more serious note though it limits the amount of time that families have to spend to spend together when they get home. When we get home it is a mad rush to do home work with children, feed pets, cook, put a load of clothes to wash, prepare for the next day. By the time we are finished doing that it is time to go to sleep. When are we supposed to relax? Probably while we are in the traffic!

While I think it is the responsibility of the government to provide proper infrastructure that would accommodate the amount of cars that they authorize to be on the roadway it is up to us as citizens both corporate and individuals to do our part to reduce the traffic. Look around at the cars in traffic new cars, old cars, luxury cars, economy cars, bling cars, vans trucks, big rims small rims and hub caps and most of them have ONE person in it. Today I did my part and carpooled with a friend. We Trinis too big for that because people will think you are a scrub if they see you in your friend’s car. More importantly how people will see the rims you pay twenty thousand dollars for if you leave you car at home.

Then there are the irresponsible corporate citizens who contribute to the traffic. Why should I be jostling a truck hauling a forty foot container on the road when I not wearing a costume and it not playing no music. Check how may of them are on the road in the morning or in the afternoon on the way home. Why don’t they haul those things in the night. Then the same container is going to stop on Frederick, Charlotte or Henry Streets to off load goods to create more traffic. Oh gosh better than that man. Then most companies in the Port of Spain area I am sure, and I could put my big head on a block for this, don’t need all their employees to be at their desk at eight o’clock. Flextime could be introduced so that all of us don’t have to make that mad rush to work for the same time then to all have to leave at the same time. There could also be decentralization of services both in the public service and in the private sector. How many companies really need to have an office in Port of Spain? Look through the telephone directory, how many companies are not providing a service that requires them to be in Port of Spain. I am no Real Estate agent but I am sure that companies could save a lot of money by moving out of the city.

I want to reiterate that traffic is our problem, created in part by us. Like many other things in society if we wait on the Government to fix it nothing will happen. I must credit the government though because attempts to fix the traffic problem have been made, widening the highways the over pass/interchange to south. However it just seems as though the number of cars on the road is increasing faster than the road expansion project. Hence the reason it is up to us to make the difference.

What have been the effects of traffic on your life? What are the ways in which you as an individual can help to reduce the traffic one step at a time? What has your employer done to deal with the traffic woes of employees?

Highway Market

Over the past few years I have noticed an upsurge in the number of highway vendors. I am referring here to the vendors who ply their trade on the highway walking between the lanes of traffic. I have also noticed a proliferation of the range of products being sold. The products available in the highway market include but are not limited to newspapers, some mosquito tennis rack thing, hats, steering wheel covers, chow, chive, pineapple, a variety of drinks, kites, seasonal items for Christmas, mother’s day and father’s day and finally the ever popular nuts.

I respect and admire these entrepreneurs because Lord knows they could have opted to be criminals instead of the hard working individuals that they are. However I think this industry has gone too far. First off it is dangerous both for the vendors and drivers. I say this because you know how we Trinis love to change lanes randomly. Add to that the occasional motorcycle or scooter and it is an accident waiting to happen. Secondly, it is annoying, Trinis want to stop on the highway to browse the wide array of selections, negotiate a discount all while the traffic flowing ahead of them. I don't even want to talk about the drivers who want to pay for a pack of nuts with a hundred dollar bill and expect to get change.

While I applaud the efforts of these individuals in their attempt to make an honest living, I really think this needs to be stopped. But as long as it continues to take people two hours to get home the market for drinks and nuts and other items would remain vibrant, because people just plain hungry. Until we solve the bigger problem of traffic this booming business would continue to expand. Do you shop at the Highway Market? If yes, What items do you purchase? If no, why not?