The story is told of the 1962 New York Mets baseball team and their first season in Major League Baseball. The team was notoriously inept, a forlorn and hapless crew, straight-up losers. Even when they seemed, by a stroke of smiling fate, to be on the cusp of an improbable win, they always managed to find a way to “snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.” Think, these current West Indies cricketers. (No offense meant). Anyway, in exasperation, the manager of the team, Casey Stengl, looked up and down his bench, searching desperately for a substitute who could go out to take the place of one of his incompetent players. He peered at them all, and then in frustration, realizing that there was not a competent, reliable player in the bunch, exclaimed, “Can’t anybody here play this game?” Apparently, not. The Mets set a baseball Major League record for most losses ever -120 versus only 40 wins.
Of course, He of a High Place must be feeling very much like Casey Stengl. He is looking up and down his bench in the Cabinet, he is pondering a reshuffling of the ministerial portfolios, but he can only shake his head and mutter in disdain, much like Scar from the Lion King, “I am surrounded by idiots!” Not that he himself is much better. The way he shoots-off at the lip, the way he has bungled this nation’s finances – see the Alfa Nero debacle, the Steve Morgan embarrassment, the ebooks and Global Ports boondoggles, the Sir Lester Bird Medical Centre mess, the Cancer Centre closure, the Nugent Avenue state-of-the-art hospital fairy tale, the reverse osmosis plants that operate at less-than-full capacity, the looting of the Medical Benefits Scheme’s rainy-day fund, the decrepit state of St John’s City, never mind the silly photo ops, the unfinished Anchorage Road bridge, the horrid road conditions from Fort James Beach to Dickenson Bay Street, the lack of adequate lighting on our highways, and so on and so forth, it is manifest that He of a High Place is just as unimpressive as all of his other ministers.
So here he is, looking down the reserve bench to see if there is someone, anyone, that he can use to replace the good Minister of Health. After all, there is a growing chorus for him to be replaced, what with our health care on life-support. Pass the ventilator and the IV. Which beggars the question: Who, in this pathetic administration could do a better job than the incumbent Minister of Health? Certainly not the good Minister of Education. Remember, the jury is still out as to whether he is worse than his predecessor, the absolutely dreadful Michael Browne. Of course, it is difficult to beat Michael Browne on the ineptitude scale. Needless to say, they both get an ‘F’.
And what about the good Minister of Works. Sigh! Poor thing. Since we cannot say anything good about her stewardship at Works, we will politely refrain from saying anything at all. Ditto, the befuddled Minister of Tourism. He’d had enough of politics, and was really not interested in running again, this last election. But they persuaded him to stay. And he did. But his heart and soul are not in it – he is merely treading water and counting the days until he can finally sail off into the sunset. To put him in charge of Health, would be making bad matters worse, and in the field of Health, there is nothing more egregious than that. After all, those responsible for the health and well-being of others swear by the Hippocratic oath – by Apollo the physician, and Aesculapius the surgeon, likewise Hygeia and Panacea, and all the gods and goddesses of health to first do no harm, and uphold all ethical standards. The Health incumbent, and all his possible successors would do more harm than good. Think six of one, half-a-dozen of the other.
Then there is the good Foreign Minister. He is arguably the best of the sorry bunch. But with the way that this administration has been doing things, it is doubtful that he would be able to resuscitate Health. The same can be said of the good Minister of Information, Telecommunications and the Antigua Public Utilities Authority. This dude cannot even finish a two-by-four bridge on a major artery in his Constituency. A bridge, mind you, that leads to a major five-star hotel, with another one currently being constructed. Sigh!
And the same can be said of the good Attorney General. He is infamous for talking a good show, but delivering precious little. None, . . . but not one of those in this administration, has distinguished his or herself during his or her tenure. And there really is nothing to cause us to believe that they will do a better job at the Ministry of Health. We submit that the call for the incumbent Minister of Health to be relieved of his Health portfolio is a non-starter, it will go nowhere. Because, when He of a High Place looks in the Players’ Pavilion, when he surveys his bullpen, the pickings are slim. There is no charismatic and visionary Minister of Health waiting in the wings to save the day.
Pass the defibrillator, prepare the operating theatre for surgery. Oooops! Nothing here works.
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