WE STILL CAN’T GO ON THIS WAY, EXPLAINER

“LORRAINE” is the immortal anthem of lonely heart Trinis abroad during Carnival. 

But Explainer was also in the last batch of strident calypsonians roused by social consciousness to crusade for the common man and hold the authorities to account. 

In “We Just Can’t Go On This Way,” Explainer agonised about injustice, demanding: “Time to make dem oppressors pay/So the people could see dey way.” 

The anguish of “Kicksing In Parliament” – of almost 50 years ago! – is still fresh, especially with the latest rush of egotism on top of incompetence. 

“So much ah dutty water we drinking/Nothin’ in the country wukking/In Parliament, they kicksing.” 

But Explainer warned us in “The Tables Turning” that: “Today you rule a kingdom/Tomorrow you are the oppressed one.”  

He cited the 1979 Iranian revolution, which is pertinent at this time when people are once more rising against their repressive, backward leaders. 

During the peak of his career, from the late 1970s to 1990s, Explainer was a visitor to newsrooms, adhering to an age-old practice by calypsonians of sounding out journalists on their new offerings. 

In conversations, as with his music, he expressed anxieties about the condition of his land. 

He was an outspoken voice in the era just before calypso became weaponised, and when artistes saw it as their duty to campaign for the voiceless. 

Explainer’s passing has had me reflecting on calypso prose that stirred national consciousness. 

In one of my first visits to a calypso tent, Brother Valentino sang “Dis Place Nice,” a tongue-in-cheek comment on the state of the dispossessed. 

“Trinidadians is who should own land,” he stressed, in commenting on big-shots with foreign interests grabbing real estate. 

Years later, land ownership is still a thorny matter. 

In the cynical “Don’t Cry,” Crusoe snapped: “Now that rainy days are here/I don’t know why we didn’t prepare/Trinidad has no right to be bawling now.” 

And: “We spend millions on food alone/When we coulda grow we own.”  

Also: “TTEC still shedding load/WASA still digging up the road/The whole country in real trouble everywhere. 

“When cash was flowing in the land/We failed to produce and to plan. 

“It is plain to see/The vengeance of Moko falling on we.” 

Shorty rendered a similar verdict during that period in the sarcastic “Money Eh No Problem.” 

“Dat dutty water we have to drink/WASA say it clean but it smelling stink.” 

And: “Our roads are the worst in the Caribbean/We have the worst traffic jam you have ever seen. 

“Public transport in this wealthy country so bad/Trying to get home on evenings could drive you mad. 

“When it rain it flood in Port of Spain/The drains under strain. 

“People saying this country blight/So much money and still nothin’ eh right.” 

At a time when an average-size chicken costs $80, I pondered on Sparrow’s “Capitalism Gone Mad.”  

“You have to be in skulduggery/Making yuh money illicitly/To live like somebody/In dis country.” 

Birdie sang: “To provide for yuh family/On yuh salary/Is an impossibility/So many bills to pay/There is no conceivable way/To save for a rainy day/In dis country.” 

And this: “Big business making everybody feel/The government give dem an open licence to steal.” 

That led me to Sparrow’s epic “Good Citizen,” sung in the early 1970s, but even more urgent and applicable at this time, when the gap between rich and poor is as wide as an overflowing Caroni River. 

“A blind man could see/It is all blatant hypocrisy/The real traitors are all high in society/Yet the government protecting all ah dem/And penalising you and me.” 

“In a million ways they violate the law/Is dem no-good bastards who oppress the poor/They selling black market/Making excess profit/Paying starvation salary/These good citizens are the architect of economic slavery.” 

In his days of courage, Chalkdust dared to confront the maximum leader on society’s many ills. 

“Ministers and all building apartment/And Chalkdie, you and me cyar pay dey high rent.” 

And: “The boat dey miss, dey should first fix/All the bobol in the civil service.” 

That sample, and other biting calypsoes on behalf of the underclass, still mirrors the state of our troubled land – billions of dollars later. 

Our one-time “woke” artistes have gone the way of all flesh, but Explainer’s stinging conclusion is still alarmingly true. 

We just can’t go on this way!