This is a country on tenterhooks. This is France before the Revolution. We are witnessing an era of ‘L’etat c’est moi’ (“I am the State”) and après nous le déluge, (“After us the deluge”). This is Iran in the last days of the Shah; Philippines before the flight of the Marcoses; Indonesia before the overthrow of Suharto. The masses are hungry, restive; each one has a hundred grievances against the status quo. The economy has failed. The treasury is empty. The conditions are ripe for a revolution – for a paradigm shift in the way this country is governed and its resources allocated – to determine a change in the nation’s priorities for succeeding generations and do away with the culture of entitlement.
But then why is it not happening? Are we collectively a passive nation content to drift as the wind blows, suffer the daily slings and arrows and blame it on our destiny. Is there a lack of leadership? Then why doesn’t a new leader step forward. Leaders are created by circumstances, mostly adverse. Haven’t we suffered enough economic and political deprivation to forge half a dozen leaders who would change the destiny of this nation? Yet, not a pip squeak from anyone.
The Marxists were right, the frail facade of petit bourgeois respectability and their conventional conservatism will never allow them to upset the apple cart. They are happy with the crumbs that fall to their lot. For change, we must look to the working class – the proletariat, who have nothing to lose – to raise the banner, man the trenches and lead the revolution. This is not a job for our effete civil society.
