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It has become something of shame and disgrace to the rest of the nation to witness the behaviour of parliamentarians in and out of the Red House. When those elected to govern the country and ensure citizens are treated with fairness and equity, and the vulnerable are taken care of adequately and efficiently, we find individuals from both sides of the political divide squabbling about very petty and unimportant issues. The distraction has become unbearable for the ordinary citizen—to such an extent that some have thrown in the towel and have retorted that it’s “same old, same old”. It appears as though this precedent was set a long time ago and Opposition MPs keep throwing mauvais langue at ruling party members, and ruling party members see it as their duty to reply to keep face. Imagine, one-time minister of education Dr Gadsby-Dolly could ask the present Minister of Education, “When does the current school term end?” The sitting minister saw it fit to answer, “In December.” Wouldn’t the ex-minister already know this, having sat at the head table of the ministry for a number of years? Also, previous minister in the ministry of national security Keith Scotland would waste Parliament’s time to ask the present Minister of Homeland Security, Roger Alexander, “How many years is 24 months?” This is the height of ludicrousness and waste of parliamentary time, not to mention wastage of opportunities to conduct the people’s business. Sometimes, we take this “parliamentary privilege” rhetoric too far. It is time that those elected or even selected to conduct the business of the country put aside personal differences and party allegiances and get serious about “running a country”, or gracefully demit office and allow someone else to do what they are paid to do.
