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| | | | | Articles | | | Goa - SEZs - The Future
GOA - SEZs – The FUTURE
By: Floriano Lobo
General Secretary,
Goa Su-Raj Party/Goa Environmental Action Group.
Component of Goa’s Movement Against SEZs [GMAS]
Address: Pirazona, Moira,Bardez –GOA-403507
Telephones: Res/0832-2470223 (M) 9890470896
If anyone had to ask me what I made out of Goa`s SEZs fiasco and where I place the blame, I would say that the SEZs in Goa may have had a temporary set-back with the pubic outcry to scrap all SEZs from the face of Goa, but they are certainly not clinically dead yet. It is a question of lots of unaccountable crores of rupees changing hands towards a lot of commitments which cannot be easily negated. The Chief Minister has done a perfect balancing act, using this opportunity to the hilt to make himself the savior of the his pet Aam Aadmi; to consolidate his vote bank and to facilitate his ‘laughing to the next hustings’ marathon walk. I dare say that all his efforts towards seeing the SEZs go is not at all appreciated. They are indeed, and, as a payment for this, he might just lose his hard-earned chair. But one thing is certain. The one who takes over the chair with his ouster will be the one behind the driving forces of the vested interests; the number one enemy of Goa. This person must not be allowed to warm the chair for even a single day.
Sadly, the disastrous planning and policies for Goa are expected to remain firmly rooted on the drawing boards for the immediate future, with scant regard for Goa`s identity, ecology, environment and the long-standing social fabric. It is apparent that ‘alien’ termites have hit upon this literal feastly haven that is Goa and want to eat it all away in haste like there is no tomorrow. And the local home-grown termites that we Goans seem to elect time and time again have joined in on the band wagon. Goa will not remain Goa for long if we Goans fail to address the issue of ‘what we want from our ‘political-class’ and ‘planners’ and how we go about protecting Goa from this terminal ‘development-centered’ disease. As rightly said by more than one Goa-Centric personalities who may or may not be the sons of Goa but who love Goa for what it is, Goa does not require policies that will race its development, but policies that will conserve what it has, since Goa is already a developed State. The need of the hour is to inject a carefully planned infrastructural fine-tuning in Goa’s veins to protect and sustain what we already have with a massive dose of committed clean-up to leave Goa to develop automatically at its own relaxed pace. The true essence of this cry for development from our political class and the political line-toting spineless bureaucracy is to fill up their own coffers as commission agents, mostly to re-circulate these ill gotten gains to subvert the democratic electoral process to win elections. The blame for all that has happened to Goa since 1961 and what happens in the years to come will depend on how we Goans answer this question. It goes without saying that we, the people of Goa, must own the blame for electing our representatives and not holding them responsible and accountable for their self-centered actions for far too long.
It is said that ‘people get the government they deserve’ If the Goan people truly wanted governments that work for them, then they would have seen to it that they were concerned enough to get themselves ‘involved’ in safe-guarding the electoral process from being subverted. And this does not come without a little self-sacrifice. Unfortunately for us, we have missed the bus. The general refrain leading to this is: “ politics is dirty ” . “I don’t want any part of it ”. Therefore, the million dollar question is “ Who is making politics dirty?”. Throw a dog a large enough bone to keep itself occupied and it will not be bothered who comes and goes and who does what as long as there is no threat to its bone. If this is true, then haven’t we, who crib and cry at every attempt made by politicians to steal from us, actually encouraged them to do so, by not being interested in politics, which by the way, happens to run our entire lives?
When I say ‘involved’, I am talking about the more informed middle and upper middle class Goans and lovers of Goa, our Religious and Social Institutions, our Educational Institutions, our NGOs etc. After all politics is a commodity that affects our everyday life whether we like it or not. The ordinary folks, the lower middle class and the poor who, by the way, constitute the major force who vote and elect the political misfits, are busy making ends meet or to eke-out a living. Who occupies the chairs of power is hardly their concern. An election-time gift is all that is necessary to motivate them to feed the voting queues to ensure the victories of the undesirables. On the other hand, the rich and the powerful do not give a damn who occupies the chairs of power. The have all the bones to keep the political dogs satisfied at all times.
It is not enough for the well informed to only exercise their franchise and leave politics to its fate. The well informed cannot remain politically apolitical if their vote is going to be marginalized. In short, the well informed must gear-up to see that they get the government that they deserve, for, there are more ways than one to do just that. If we have really understood what politics is all about, one need not be the contesting politician. One can be a politician nevertheless. The only qualification needed here is to possess the guts to speak-out against the wrong-doings and support ‘clean’ alternatives, and more importantly, be a part of those alternatives. We Goans have been shouting about the many wrongs from our roof tops for a long time but the wrong do not seem to end. On the contrary, our plates are getting heaped upon. It is to be remembered well that ‘POLITICS NEED NOT BE DIRTY’ . It also can be clean if one wants it that way.
It is a fact that Goa did not deserve RP-2011. It is a fact that Goa did not deserve the SEZs that were secretly unleashed on it. It is a fact that Goa does not deserve the ODPs, the garbage problem, the acute water shortages, the development of its coastal belt through CRZ violations left right and centre. One look at our public transport system is enough for us to go down in history books as being the most passive and unconcerned people. No wonder the world has called us Goans ‘SUCEGAD’. The height of it all is that a city bus turns turtle due to rash and negligent driving with unfortunate casualties when the ‘Road Safety Week’ is being observed. Again it is the height of tolerance that the Minister of Transport himself behaves in a most irresponsible manner while he is not on official work , where gentlemen citizens face arrest and detention merely for requesting the Minister to observe priority during the ferry crossing [ ref. to the report of the Santo Estevao ferry crossing fracas- GT- 7 Jan, 2008]. Does Goa deserve this high-handed attitude from its elected servants? The question that crops up is ?WHO IS THE MASTER AND WHO IS THE SERVANT? Infact, both these incidents should have seen the ouster of this minister from his throne.
All this is happening not because Goans are loving and caring, hospitable, honorable and understanding, tolerant etc. This is happening because the political class has seen to it that the Goan’s backbone has been broken, in fact rendered spineless. And the reason for this is that Goans have been pacified and blinded and divided through different clubs of thoughts to the extent that they have lost their reason and self-respect. As an example, it would be very difficult for me as a member of one club to change-over to another club even if the club I belong to no longer lives to its professed ideals, the ideals that had attracted me to it in the first place. The sense of belongingness that has been cultivated within me will hold me prisoner to the extent that if I left to join some other club, it would be admitting to a lot of mistakes that my club has committed and which mistakes I have been defending all along, being its faithful member.
In the same vein, time and time again, we, the people of Goa have gotten rotten deals by the dozens such as the SEZs, RPs-2011, the TCP Ordinances , IFFIs, Meta Strips, the polluting Cuncolim Industrial Estate, the language imbroglio and what have you, since 1961. But then these things will go on happening because we have never understood the Master-Servant role that politics is built on. It goes without saying that if the master of the household does not know how the servant is supposed to behave; what it is that s/he has to do and not do, then what the master gets is a whole lot of a mess with the dangers of losing everything he has worked for, including his well-being. A good master will show the door to a bad servant at the first opportunity.
Consider all the problems that Goa has had since 1961 and we Goans must accept that we have never understood the Master-Servant role in democracy. Perhaps, that was because the Goan backs were broken during the 450 year rule by the Portuguese to render us unquestioningly servile and unfit for democracy. We however got rid of the Portuguese masters in the euphoria that we wanted to be our own masters. But in the bargain, our long standing servility never allowed us to attain that role, miserably succumbing to the will of devious, sweet-talking, pillaging masters from across the borders, and falling prey to their vicious designs. They saw to it that we remained permanently and infinitely saddled down to the role of being ‘freed’ servants who remain contented with mere crumbs.
In a dictatorship, the will of the dictator is supreme and every thing falls in place accordingly whether the people like it or not. [Ex. SEZs of China]. While in a democracy, the collective will of the people is supposed to prevail in how things are done. On the other hand, there are two types of dictatorships. Benevolent and Intolerant. History tells us that King Solomon was a benevolent dictator who ruled through reason and compassion. Whereas history also tells us of the intolerant Hitler´s regime in Germany which led to the genocide of over 6 million Jews.
Goa, having been annexed by India in 1961 through an act of war, we Goans have been euphoric about the democracy that we have been denied, and which the rest of India was enjoying since 1947. However, the revelation has descended on us like a thunderbolt 47 long years later, that we have to liberate ourselves from the so called liberation in 1961, if we wish to survive. The fact is that however wicked the Portuguese rule may have been made out to be, one good thing that they did was to see the merits in Goa’s Gaunkaries [Comunidades], the then prevailing local, indigenous most effective and potent agro-civic institutions they inherited. Not only did they nurture and preserve these, but also re-wrote the Code that these were going by, in the Portuguese language. Enter democracy, our home-grown rulers have seen to it that Goa’s Comunidades are almost wiped out within a short span of just 47 years, to undo more than a thousand centuries old agriculture & general civic management traditions. And in its place they have introduced the imported, most ineffective and equally corrupt system called the Panchayati Raj, a system of governance where Goa’s greens, its productive fields and even its pristine beaches are turning into concrete jungles. Our home-grown masters have seen to it that our agriculture is clinically dead, for obvious reasons. If RP-2011 was not it, the SEZs exposed all pretenses, that what we were nurturing in the guise of democracy was nothing but hard-core autocracy, where a single democratically elected peoples’ servant could decide that SEZs were good for Goa. That the Master-Servant role could be so conveniently reversed with impunity without attracting slightest of punishment is something that must keep us – the more conscious Goans- awake most nights.
Things will remain unchanged if we Goans do not learn, and mighty quickly at that, to tear and throw out that which is eating into our Goan-ness, to render us identity-less zombies in times to come. And at the same time we must learn to embrace that which will serve us and our posterity well, so that we march into today’s globalized world with our heads held high.
Let us be smart for once and look ahead for the next coming Assembly Elections, to get for ourselves and our children, the good-effective governance, by doing all of these things with passion, to turn around the prevailing ‘High Command’ dictated, autocratically run democratic system of self-governance, the least that we Goans, who call ourselves most enterprising and who are spread-out all across the world, can do.
Let us forget, for once, that we belong to, or, have a soft corner for one or the other national political parties. We have consistently done this for the past 47 years and have been cheated and marginalized to the worst extent.
Let us demand from all political parties or politically apolitical groupings, as a pre-election perquisite, to give us a written-down ‘model governing system’, which they will follow, honor and respect at all times if voted in. Let them tell us, in writing, what they will do, and how; and, what they will not do, and why, for, it is not enough that we are heaped with goodies only. We also need to know to what extent our waist-belts need to be tightened and sacrifices made in order to get a good, decent life.
Let us collectively compare what different political parties and groupings give us as their model system of governance to vote for them by. Let us debate these varied systems to find out if what is said will hold water when the time comes or just turn into jelly and remain just promises to con us out of our vote. Let us pick up the best out of them all. Let us committedly stand in the voting lines and exercise our franchise for what we believe in. Let us vote in favor of the best system of governance offered to us, irrespective of the party symbol, not looking at who the candidate is. If the respective party wants to take us seriously for once, they will have to field candidates who are more than acceptable to us. Let us vote for the best system and not for individuals or the preferred political party symbols. Let us stop doing the mistake that we have been doing all along in our new democratic avatar. And, most importantly, let us remember that we shall be doing this for perhaps the last time ever as Goans.
Let us shun inducements, donations and gifts to favour voting. Let our institutions [Churches, Chapels, Temples, Mosques & Sporting Clubs] fall down to the ground if they must, but let us not accept election-time political donations and cut our own throats by jeopardize Goa’s well-being and to render our institutions hollow hypocrites of all times. At best, even if we accept all what is freely given, let us accept it understanding well that this is coming from the loot and plunder of the government treasury effected through occupying high government positions, the same treasury that we have been filling-up through our hard toil by paying our taxes. For this once, when it is time to punch to button on the voting machine, or stamp the ballot paper, irrespective of what elections they are [ Parliament/Assembly/Municipal/Panchayat], let us collectively do it for ourselves and for our children and not to perpetuate the loot and plunder that rightfully belongs to us.
Let us look at ‘Independents’ very suspiciously. They are attached to no set ideology; who are a ‘one man/woman’ show; who are most often funded by the worst of selfish vested interests, who make out to be committed and want to even die for us. Independents are like the air-socks mounted at airfields, changing their positions as according to the prevalent wind directions. If at all more damage is done to the democratic electoral system, the credits go to the Independents. Even if there were exceptions, there is always a price tag, however high.
More importantly, as institutions, groups and NGOs, let us work hard to bring awareness to, and compliance of, the ill-informed. This mass-base electors inevitable always turns the tide in favor of the undesirables, to frustrate genuine needs of the well informed.
And finally, let us remember that our children, who are yet to be the born future Goans, will ask us in time, the question as to why we had remained deaf, dumb and impotent, while this world acclaimed paradise on earth was being torn apart, if we fail to ‘ACT’ responsibly ‘NOW’.
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GOA needs a 'REVOLUTION' if it is to see better days.
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email: goasuraj@sancharnet.in
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Goa Su-Raj Party has been in existence since 31/08/2000.
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