Today marks thirty years since armed insurgents invaded Trinidad and Tobago’s parliament and the sole television station in a failed coup d’état. What followed over the next six days was the looting and burning of the city, the death of twenty-four people and lasting damage to the psyche of the nation.
The Jamaat-al-Muslimeen and its leader, Yasin Abu Bakr, was never punished for this treasonous crime. A poor ruling by the nation’s Court of Appeal upheld an amnesty that was later invalidated by the Privy Council. But the group was never rearrested or charged.
If karma were real, these people, especially the leader, would have paid the ultimate price. Instead, they continue to roam free, with members continuing to have run-ins with the law.
I’ve stopped believing in karma a long time ago. When I saw my cousin – who has never done wrong in his life and always willing to lend a hand – have a wife leave for him another man, then trying to make another life in the US only to come down with COVID-19 and die; karma does not exist. What goes around does not come around.
There is little justice in the world.
Inequality and cronyism that’s taking opportunities away from people who deserve it more. That’s injustice too.
That’s why we keep fighting.