“The fish rots from the head.”

That’s one of the lessons I picked up in the corporate arena and have carried everywhere with me ever since.

In any organisation (public or private) with a pervasive culture of shenanigans, you can bet your bottom dollar that the root of the issue is at the top of the ladder. Whether that means the boss is directly involved in the nonsense or simply turning a blind eye, nothing changes until leadership changes. Because that’s what leadership is (supposed to be): the person(s) leading the organisation.

The same applies to any group of people. Be it a family, a classroom… or a society. If the person at the tippy top—the person with the authority—is on shit, then shit is what will flow downhill.

With that in mind, let’s look at what the Chief Secretary of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) had to say about his island’s crime situation during his Divali address.

Look at what’s happening in our little villages—the fact that criminals have been able to flourish. It is because light has been absent. It is because the light is absent why mothers are supporting the criminal activities of their sons. They’re enjoying the fruits of criminal activities. They are not asking questions about why their sons are behaving the way they are.

“So how did we arrive at a place where we have become so comfortable with criminal activity, so comfortable knowing that the drug dealer is living downstairs or in homes? Darkness is, in essence, the absence of light.

Gonzales, E. Farley blames Tobago mothers for rise in crime. 421st October, 2024. Guardian.

Imagine.

Of all the things Farley Augustine—a father himself—could say about how Tobagonians need to come together to address their spiralling crime rate, he chose to lay the blame at the feet of the island’s mothers.

Why would the man representing the highest authority on the island think it a good idea to inspire his people by blaming half of them for crimes largely committed by the other half?

Why not?

After all, he’s only following in the footsteps of his illustrious Trinidadian counterpart (himself, ironically, a Tobagonian), who not only responded to calls for his help with our terrifying domestic violence rate by calling on women to make better choices years ago, but doubled down on it recently after an Assistant Commissioner of Police dared to suggest that a murder victim might be partially responsible for her own murder.

And then there’s his subordinate, who recently sat in what is supposed to be an honoured seat in a hallowed building and ran his mouth about the Opposition Leader (who has her own interesting ideas about women) in front of a live mic.

And the one with the direct responsibility for National Security, who feels comfortable with regularly admitting that he cyah do nuttin with the billions of dollars and manpower we’ve given him and calling on people with much less money and security at their disposal to fix it for him.

And let’s not forget the one who compared the nation’s mothers to cows and dogs.

With leadership like that, is it any wonder why we’ve already crossed 500 murders for 2024 (with an 8.37% detection rate) and why we’re averaging a domestic violence murder every two weeks?

I’m not being hyperbolic here, eh. Aside from the fact that the buck for the state of our society stops with our leaders… because they’re the people we vested with power to… lead… What message do you think it sends to have leadership that sees 500 murders (and counting)—the vast majority of which were committed by men—and sees fit to blame women? Not parents, eh. Not fathers, who, one might think, are critical to shaping a young man’s sense of self. Women.

What message does it send when the Prime Minister sees our domestic violence rates and holds the victims responsible for the violence committed against them? Is it any wonder there are so many stories about the TTPS dismissing domestic violence reports when the ACoP seems to think that a woman who was allegedly murdered by a man against whom she had a restraining order would willingly go to his home to be killed?

Exactly.

Assuming we’re to believe that the people in authority have the good sense to wield the power we’ve granted them, we have to wonder why they seem so dedicated to encouraging the things they claim to want to stop.

We also have to take a long, hard look at the head of this particular fish and ask ourselves what condition we really expect the rest of the body to be in.

Cause allyuh, it eh smelling good.