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In September 1973, we, as a nation, were blessed with a bonanza from new offshore discoveries and a sharp rise in oil prices triggered by the Yom Kippur War and the new militancy of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
In what was said to be an unguarded moment in the House of Representatives, Dr Eric Williams said, “Money is not an issue”—often remembered as “Money is not a problem”.
Our trade balance turned positive (from negative $159 million in 1972 to a positive $602 million in 1979). Government oil revenues moved from $33 million in 1972 to $1.58 billion by 1980. Foreign exchange reserves jumped from $28 million in 1973 to $2.7 billion in early 1981. (Parris, 1983).
God smiled on us! Trinidad and Tobago had “an energy boom stronger than the ones in the 1970s and 1980s” in the 2000s.
While Dr Trevor Farrell (2022) masterfully dissected the shortcomings observed in our execution of the Point Lisas dream, the real damage was in the nation’s social fabric. Food was imported, not grown. We fell desperately short of building homes, and real estate prices skyrocketed.
The government payroll doubled ($360 million to $769.6 million in 1983), but it was reported that 10% of the households received a third of the total wealth generated. Car ownership multiplied by 65% in six years.
On the other hand, the 40% of the population at the bottom received about a tenth.
Then, more seeds of destruction were planted. Capital flight (35% of GDP) outpaced the rate of growth (15%) mainly through trade mis-invoicing by the end of the 1990s (Salandy and Henry, 2017).
Most of us can recall the sums misspent on the Point Fortin Highway, the Brian Lara Stadium, and the Waste Water project. The 14% wage hike for public sector employees in 2015, on top of a 9% increase in 2011—while there was an estimated decline in 2015 oil revenues of $7.4 billion—boggled our minds.
Productivity did not increase. The March 2016 IMF’s pronouncement “[…] taking into account the size of energy revenue windfalls, the country has under-saved and under-invested in their future [which] could lead the country to uncomfortable levels of debt…” should suffice as a reminder of how we again blew our money like it was going out of style.
Photo: Unctt.com
The nation became like barrel children—we got goodies, but no love.
Inequality increased. We got money to party but not to live a better life. Our hospitals staggered under the load of neglect. Our government-run schools in several areas became places of abject despair.
Dancehall artists came in first-class airline seats to headline shows, taking away our precious foreign exchange. Corruption, engineered by politicians and private sector individuals, became brazen.
This growing divide also took root in our schools. Private primary schools flourished. The government primary schools struggled for essential resources.
While some children were ferried in cars, others trudged the streets and were at the mercy of taxi drivers or our unreliable bus system. An estimated 10% of our children were left hungry.
Our “prestige schools” assumed the role of being feeder schools for US colleges. We witnessed a sudden upsurge of interest in extra-curricular activities in these schools. We would be fooled into believing it was entirely a newfound love for the culture. It was often about preparing for entrance into good US schools.
Photo: Daniel Prentice/ Wired868
Quietly, the cream of our students disappears and seldom returns. Our potential pool of leaders shrinks despite our investment.
Inside these prestige schools lies a dilemma for the leadership. “Excellence”, that slippery concept, is defined by the dominant culture. This reality results in a biased outcome since resources and opportunities are not considered.
Excellence is equated to academic achievement defined by the number of scholarships. Schools are deathly afraid to fall behind, and so double their efforts to produce scholarship winners.
(Courtesy Karla Ramoo/bmobile)
This focus means that high-achieving, low-income students fortunate to enter those schools are disadvantaged. They have a bundle of problems and insecurities. The teachers have little time to induce their flourishing.
Many of these students do not perform as well as they could. They do not have the same opportunities to be successful as children from affluent families and children from loving families.
In March 2023, the IDB Education Chief, Ms Mercedes Mateo, described our broader problem: “In Latin America and the Caribbean, more than 50% of 15-year-olds do not understand what they read, and around 60% do not have basic math skills…which is the basis for acquiring the rest of the skills needed to prosper in the 21st century.”
(via Ministry of Education)
This assessment confirms the 2013 Ministry of Education’s assessment that 50% of our children need significant neurodevelopment assistance. Should we look at the percentage of our children who cannot achieve the 50% mark in the SEA examinations, we will realise it is the same number that pops up.
What more proof do we need before we act? After ten years of inaction, what outcomes do we expect?
“Socioeconomic factors are what mostly constitute the risks of ending up in crime, not ethnicity,” says Felipe Estrada Dörner, a professor of criminology at Stockholm University whose research focuses on juvenile delinquency and segregation?
He adds: “…to slow down the supply of recruits to gangs, inequality must be reduced. Harsher punishments, which governments invest a lot of resources in now, will not overcome those problems.”
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