Wasn’t me!

No responsibility
The excuses offered by Carl “Barry” Greenidge for missing the scheduled meeting with the Finance Ministry’s team to discuss the budget have degenerated beyond ‘ridiculous’. As pointed out by Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh, Greenidge is blaming everybody but himself – not just the Finance Ministry, but his party’s erstwhile ally – the AFC – and (most astoundingly!) his own party, the PNC.
Sad thing is, the facts of the matter – which are all in the public domain – make Greenidge’s culpability self-evident. With all his bobbing and weaving, he couldn’t deny that he weaselled out of the first meeting of February 28. He can plead that he had another meeting or whatever, but it then became his responsibility for suggesting and making another meeting.
To blame his colleagues by snidely remarking that there were others on APNU/PNC’s budget team, doesn’t say much for his aspirations to leadership. A leader can’t duck responsibility. Even if those other individuals such as Lance Carberry could have rescheduled – the buck stopped with Greenidge, their shadow finance minister. We won’t even touch the low blow Greenidge delivered to his comrades by whining that they finked on him in the press.
Then came the ultimate “scraping-the-bottom-of-the-barrel” excuse: that the AFC had pulled out of the budget talks. Now what in the world does this have to do with the APNU/PNC’s budget team? Are they in a formal coalition with the AFC? Enquiring minds want to know. The law even has a phrase for all these facts as they relate to Greenidge’s guilt: res ipso loquitur – the thing speaks for itself.
But we believe that Greenidge, caught figuratively with his pants down, took the advice of Shaggy. A friend (like Greenidge) ran to Shaggy and confessed frantically: “Honey came in and she caught me red-handed/Picture this, we were both butt naked/ banging on the bathroom floor.” Shaggy advised: ‘say it wasn’t you’. (Edited)
“But she caught me on the counter (It wasn’t me)
Saw me on the sofa (It wasn’t me)]
I even had a shower (It wasn’t me)
She even caught me on camera (It wasn’t me)
She saw the marks on my shoulder (It wasn’t me)
Heard the words that I told her (It wasn’t me)”
Greenidge should know that in the end, he has to ‘fess up’.

The abuse of mercy
The sniping on the Linden CoI’s compensation award continues unabated. The latest is by Red Thread, which shares a meaningful relationship with the aged Buxton sage Eusi Kwayana. Readers of this column would remember that when early in the day, Kwayana condemned the CoI’s report even before it was issued (sages are evidently also seers) we predicted it was to set the ground for his acolytes to protest later.
Now our point on the monetary award is that compensation could only have been awarded if ‘wrongful death’ had been proven. “Wrongful death” is the taking of the life of an individual resulting from the wilful or negligent act of another person or persons. In order to be compensated for wrongful death, it must be proven that the acts or omissions of the defendant were the proximate cause of the decedent’s injuries and death. This means that the defendant’s wrongful conduct must have created a natural, direct series of events that led to the injury.
The CoI admitted that it had never been proved that the police fired the fatal shots. The awards were an act of mercy that is now being exploited for political gain. Enough!!!