August 17, 2011Dear Sir,Today I was stopped and challenged with the question, “Well what do you think of your PLP Government now? You can’t blame white folks for what they have done!”I think that there are others who might make the same challenge! So:I can and do blame the decades of racism and segregation for the deep social and racial divide which continues to hold this society hostage. I can and do blame this same racism and segregation for the social, psychological and economic damage inflicted on the entire black Community!One thing that I think of the PLP Government is that it is a product of and reflection of the black community. It may never have wanted to be a” black party” but it is and it governs today because of the black community. It, therefore, has a special obligation and responsibility to the black community. If it has failed to recognise this reality because it did not want to be a “black party”, that too is because the black community has not made that demand.In 1998 the euphoria which we experienced was, too often, not because envisioned justice for a demeaned and exploited black community, and the most disadvantaged among us, it was often because they would be Blacks who would enjoy the status and prestige of the political roles. That was easy for our elected representatives. The status and prestige.Meanwhile we, as a black community, have bemoaned the condition of “the black male”, bewailed the circumstances and poverty of the many single mothers, and decried the “lack of knowledge” the indifference and irresponsibility of a younger generation who have turned their backs on the values which have preserved us over generations of degrading and demeaning segregation and economic exploitation when none of us had either status or prestige.We have failed to recognise and address the damage done not to this group or that group or the other group but to the entire black community. Those who seem to have survived economically have not always “survived” psychologically. They too have internalised the racism and the racial self-rejection. As a result we have not demanded that every candidate, who hopes for our vote, has as his/her priority concern about the economic disparity and the psychological damage which continues to bedevil us. We cannot be surprised if some of our candidates, MPs or Cabinet Ministers seem to view the majority of us, the economically and culturally disadvantaged, with indifference and a lack of respect because many of us as voters do the same since we have made status and prestige, rather than justice, a priority.We never protested when the previous administration poured money into the pockets of those who were not members of the black community and/or were foreigners who could not even vote while not seriously addressing the economic conditions of those who had put them there. We accepted it.Until we, each one of us in the black community, recognise that most of those who are stopped by the police, or who are in prison, or on financial aid, are black while most of those in the boardrooms, or who are managers and CEOs, are white is not because of some natural process. It is the result of decades of deliberate Government policies of racism, segregation and white affirmative action and only our demand that the PLP Government adopt deliberate policies to turn this around, including black affirmative action, nothing will ever change.That is what I think of “my PLP Government”!EVA N HODGSONHamilton Parish