The Midnight Robber enters stage left. Cape sweeping. Hat broader than the cabinet. Whistle in hand. He plants his stick. He begins.
HEAR ME NOW
I am the Midnight Robber. Born under the sign of the dry tap. Raised on the prayers of women boiling brown water. Schooled by the truck that comes Tuesday — sometimes.
You think you know thirst? YOU KNOW NOTHING. I drank from a standpipe in 1987 that was older than my grandmother. And my grandmother was older than the Constitution.
HEAR ME NOW, MINISTERS
You speak of three desalination plants. THREE. Not one. Not two. THREE. You announce them like a man announcing a cricket score. You say “procurement.” You say “phased rollout.” You say “stakeholder consultation.”
I say: THE SEA IS RIGHT THERE. It has been right there since before your grandfather’s grandfather signed his first form. It will be right there long after your sub-committee on optics dissolves itself in the heat of its own reports.
Why does it take three plants and a procurement cycle to deliver what the catchment pond in San Fernando holds for free?
HEAR ME NOW, COMMITTEE
You sit in your conference room. You schedule your follow-up meeting. You table the matter for the next quarter. You append the appendix to the appendix. You CC the memo to the working group on memos.
Meanwhile. MEANWHILE. The breadfruit lady on the maxi is paying eleven dollars for a two-litre bottle that came from the same sea you cannot procure.
HEAR ME NOW, PEOPLE
The Midnight Robber does not bring solutions. The Midnight Robber brings the BILL. The bill that was never sent. The bill the Tourism Board would not table. The bill the World Bank would not finance. The bill written in chalk on a maxi-taxi seat back by a man who knew, who has always known, that the answer was the catchment pond, and the question was never about water.
THE ROBBER WITHDRAWS
I take my fee in honour. I take my fee in being heard. I take my fee in the silence after my speech, when the procurement officer remembers he has a meeting on Wednesday and the catchment pond, still, is full.
The Robber tips his hat. The whistle blows. The cape sweeps. He is gone.
The Midnight Robber is a satirical performance column inspired by the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival tradition of the Midnight Robber speech. Views expressed are dramatic exaggerations for comedic and traditional effect.