The path

I watch you as I watch a star,
Through darkness struggling into view,
And loved you better than you knew.
Somehow I knew, that you'd have to go
Your world was not mine, your eyes told me so
Yet it was there I felt the crossroads of time
And I wondered why...

To keep it or not to keep it!

For a people who claim to be as old as time, we do seem intent on outranking any other country in the number of political parties that we have. In the brief period since they had been allowed to form we had seem approx 10 parties come into existence. Is such a number sensible? Is it worth all the expenses and discontent? That is a question that had been put for debate. We had ratified our incumbent constitution on August 2008, dreaming of newer beginnings. But keeping the recent happenings in mind, it is understandable that some people seem to be questioning the very idea of a multiparty democracy. Upon asked many will gladly tell you that they had been much more happier and more content with the system that existed before. Many will blame them to be ignorant, careless, boneless or toothless. But the fact remains, perhaps there is some truth to what they say as well but what then.....

It is true that there are some fundamental changes that are necessary in our country, a change that is most likely to happen if we adhere to the new environment of awareness that is sweeping our nation. Granted, there is an increasing discontent when it comes to the increasing disconnection between the citizens and the elected leaders. But what of it. Will a new leader be able to solve that problem? Will he work for the greater good? Or his own good? These are questions that had been plaguing the many who remain undecided about their decision post the first round of election in our country.

Many of us question the need for political parties, and after all why should we not. A majority of them had not been able to give us a very good demonstration of what they are all about, that is apart from flinging dirt on one another – many of them seem as intent to get power as the opposition which seem just as intent to stay in power.

However need them we must, because a democracy needs “strong” “sustainable parties” which have the capacity and ability to provide policy choices that shows us that they have the ability to govern for the public good. To preserve and protect individual rights and freedoms, a democratic people must work together to shape the government of their choosing.

Unfortunately many of our “political leaders” seem to have forgotten the public good. Public good had been given the back seat in the bit to rank themselves the position of power. A representative democracy such as the one “we the people” are aiming for will be hard to achieve with there being no or one political party. But will our coalition which at best of times had been weak and which by its very own admission is together for one and one purpose alone “being down the incumbent president”, be strong enough to withstand the pressures that will inevitably be put before them in the time to come...

A lot of people believe that the solutions will come magically to them if they abstain from voting the second time, the ostrich syndrome i say. hiding our heads in the sand will not give us the solution, infact it robs from us the right to open our mouths the next time, harping on one injustice or the other. after all what right do those people have now to shout, when they did not choose to participate in building the nation.