Obama disappointed me

Apr 19, 2009 Features / Columnists, My Column

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I am in Trinidad and Tobago for the Fifth Summit of the Americas, not because I need to undertake overseas assignments or because I want to travel. Had Barack Obama not been coming to Trinidad I would not have left Guyana. I would have been home doing what I do every day.
I had my share of covering international assignments and in my book, the younger people should be given the opportunity because it is them who would have to be carrying on when the older people like me move on.

Because of this I refused to be sponsored by any media house, choosing to leave such sponsorship for some younger person who now needs to make international connections. But my employer, Glenn Lall, thought that it would be a good thing for me to come over and at least share some of my experience with the young reporter the newspaper selected.
To the credit of the Trinidad Government, the event was well organized. I hasten to say that Guyana does not have the capability to host such a summit. At least 5,000 people from around the world descended on the Trinidad capital, which has its fair share of large hotels. These hotel rooms disappeared before I could arrive on Thursday.
I got a reasonably good motel but that is neither here nor there; the big thing was the summit. Early Friday morning, hours before the summit began, a large section of Port of Spain was shut down, and efficiently so. In fact, the shutdown began on Thursday and the people readily acquiesced.

Business places closed their doors and I failed to hear or see a sign of protest. I certainly could not see the same thing happening in Georgetown. The mere shutting down of the area around Public Buildings evokes a lot of noise and some anger each day that there is a sitting. Not so in Trinidad and I read that the people had decided to use the opportunity to enjoy a holiday.
There was impeccable arrangement for the media, perhaps because of the large space occupied by the Hyatt Regency. The security was tight but not oppressive. I saw Guyanese policemen, many of them whom I know, aiding the Trinidadians as did other security personnel from the rest of Caribbean. I later understood that this was what the Regional Security System was all about.

I sensed that almost every reporter there wanted the same thing that I did; we all wanted to see Barack Obama in the flesh. And this desire was not confined to the reporters. It was the same with the soldiers and policemen and other security personnel, the staff who were there to cater to the whims and fancies of the people responsible for spreading the news of the summit and of course the ordinary cleaners.
I watched the delegates, chief among them the various leaders, arrive in pomp and splendor. I got a taste of who was arriving from the television crew at the airport. And indeed the planes literally piled up on each other. Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua later said that he had to sit in his aircraft for three hours–I believe that it was an exaggeration.

I saw Air Force One land and close on its heels, the aircraft that brought Hilary Clinton. I saw Obama descend even as from my vantage point near the window I kept seeing the arrivals. President Bharrat Jagdeo had arrived the day before.
The media with their extensive lenses and boom microphones hung about the entrance to the summit opening. I was going to see Obama through the glass of the media centre. Lula, Ortega, Cristina Fernandez, of Argentina, Michelle Bachelet of Chile, Morales, Manning, and on and on they came. It was only a matter of time before Barack Obama did.

The various vantage points were taken because everyone wanted to see Obama. President Jagdeo said that he was the man who made the summit the success it has been so far. He was the man of the moment.
I saw the bustle of the security and the anxiety of the various media entities. Obama was coming and I was going to get a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the first Black man to become President of the United States. I was wrong; Hugo Chavez arrived and it was a grand entrance. The media was plunged into a frenzy and Chavez milked the moment for all it was worth.
He took his time and spoke to the press at the entrance, sparking a mini-stampede that all the security personnel could not avoid. I imagined what it would have been like when Obama arrived. I was disappointed. Obama was a no-show.

I later learnt that his security personnel spirited him through another entrance, much to the disappointment of all who wanted to just get a glimpse of him. He was inside long before Chavez arrived and I did not know. Like everyone else, I had to be content with seeing him on television.
Some anger descended on me because Obama had to be treated different from everyone else. Why? Is there no equality among leaders at the summit? There was none. Obama was primus inter pares — First among equals. He was king of kings.

A colleague, when I complained, asked whether Obama was a show and I said yes. Life for public figures is a show. A television anchor dresses up to present the news; a woman puts on make-up to face the world; the whole world is a show and Barack Obama should have been part of the show.
I am still to see him and I hope that I do. And of people who think that I am the only person disappointed and angry, they are wrong. The Trinidad Guardian in its front page headline cried, “Barack sneaks into Hyatt” and “Obama slips through spectators’ fingers”.

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