Dear Editor,
In the hierarchy of human needs, the basic physiological needs (for food, water, and so on) take precedence over all other needs. As a rule, people invest the most energy in satisfying those physiological needs. For instance, oxygen and liquid: a person cannot live without air and a person would surely die for the lack of those two elements. Next are food, warmth and sex.
Once the physiological needs are satisfied because the person has food and drink and can protect himself against the weather with clothes, he builds a place where he feels safe. He tries to turn this into a stable situation as soon as he is sure that in the future he'll be able to survive there without problems.
If he succeeds in that, his attention switches to the third level, the need for togetherness. People want to belong to something; they want to belong to a group of people. They want to make friends and invest in amenities such as theatres, parks, state-of-the art cricket stadiums and mega-racetracks.
In a refugee camp everyone fights to feed himself. But, once everybody is well fed and has a safe shelter, then people put other interests in the forefront.
Unfortunately, over the past 25 years, I have witnessed far too many children come to school on an empty stomach. It was bad enough 25 years ago, and the situation has worsened considerably over the years. No wonder it has become a trend among many teachers to feed their students out of their own pockets. They realise that a hungry child cannot concentrate, hence a hungry child cannot learn.
So, you can picture my sheer astonishment at hearing a politician promise to build a state-of-the art cricket stadium cum football pitch cum softball field topped off by a mega-racetrack "within my first 100 days in office."
What's more, futuristic projections of the "cricket stadium and race-track-if-you-vote-me-into-office" are boldly flaunted on massive billboards that deface the landscape; the plans were even unveiled in grand style via a press conference, quite evidently pandering to the cricket and racing fanatics to haul in their votes. That is rather insensitive and out of touch with the reality of those poor people who (if one were to believe the political rhetoric) are the main concerns of another candidate on the same list: "My people are suffering!"
Well, I've got news for you, K.D. While your people are suffering, your commissioner is making plans to build a lavish cricket stadium. You both endorse the same list, but clearly there's a huge disparity in ideology between you and your commissioner. His promises render your commitment totally useless. And, after all is said and done, he is the man who wields the power.
This gives rise to the following question: does the commissioner really believe that his promises of things-to-come can compete with what Theo Heyliger has already accomplished (silently)? He could have roped me in by promising to start up a food programme for "my people" the impoverished school children.
Some of the money invested in those lavish billboards that deface the scenery could have gone a long way to start up such a food programme and maintain it for at least years! Besides, politicians now have the option to employ modern media and come up with more creative, cost-effective ways of advertising.
By the way, speaking of creative advertising, those elegantly curved decorative green flags nestled snugly in the nooks of the light poles bring a touch of class to the visual disarray created by all the other political paraphernalia. Why, you could easily convince yourself that they belong there. Nice touch!
Mario Brown
