Immoral Authority

“Where were the citizens who want to protect our democracy when there was evidence of political manipulation in the arrest of our former chief justice?

 “That was a huge blow to democracy. How come political relics of the past are coming forward now when they had opportunities in the past to change the system and did not take the benefit of that opportunity?”

That's Prakash Ramadar, political leader of the COP and Legal Affairs Minister, questioning the moral authority of citizens of T&T to demand better of his government.


In case you missed it, he's not-so-subtly implying that we - the people for whom he works - have no right to question the actions of the People's  Partnership Government because we did not sufficiently question the actions of the previous regime. It's an implication that this government has been making since their earliest missteps (though they usually aim it at the Opposition or labor movement) and it's extremely insidious.

It's also why no amount of agitation has really gotten through to this government yet.

The PP continuously dismisses criticism by declaring that individuals/organisations that have done the wrong thing in the past or stood idly by while someone else has done the wrong thing in the past have no grounds to criticize them. Many of their supporters are accepting this declaration as fact without questioning how it could possibly be true. Especially coming from a government that is ruled by a party that had no more moral authority than the PNM when it was in Opposition.

But let's say we pretend for a second that this argument makes sense. Who's left with the right to question this government's actions?