There’s a ‘Skettel Circus’ going around, from town to town, featuring a handful of wannabe clowns. ‘Wannabe’, we say, because clowns are known to be quite skilful at what they do; clowning around, that is. But while this crew seems intent on doing just that, the cast, we must submit, is as inept and bungling as could be.
    
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We might, therefore, have to offer an apology to the real circus and all its clowns for attempting to equate them with the institutional ineptitude that

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So, guess who are the two chief ‘wannabe’ clowns? One is the son of an ex drug-trafficking convict from O.W. (the Squeaky Leader himself), the other a failed, retired Deputy Police Chief from the Capital (God forbid she’s being groomed for one of the already too many deputy leader positions of the Party). We must concede the profiles of the ex woman cop and the ex convict’s son are quite synonymous, hence all too ominous. As Deputy Commissioner, she was inept on the job then, just as he is as Party Leader now. And when they both take to the podium, the mutual cerebral hollowness is most manifest, making them a match made in heaven. It’s trite, but true: “Fools seldom differ”.  

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There was, we recall, much grumbling throughout the ranks of the Force back then that she had been promoted to the second top cop position for no other reason than loyalty to the party in power at the time. We always knew it, and now Maureen is showing her true colours. Keep singing the ‘BLUES’, you ‘WHITED’ Sepulchre! You and that criminal gang will never make it back to Belmopan. Not in a million years! VIP, PNP, even COLA, or the Pig-tail Party (if it were still around) would have a better chance in a hundred years.      

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And please, Johnny, for goodness sake, will you stop ‘squeaking’, “Mentira, Mentira, Mentira” at the top of your ‘squeaky’ little voice. How many times more do you want to offend SAID? He might just be tempted to write another book, this time to deal with you alone. If we might suggest a title: “With Malice Towards One”, the ‘Squeaky One’, to be precise.   
   
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But let’s get back, for a little, to that ‘woman cop’ turned ‘skettel bembe’. (And we must pause here to remind you that ‘skettel’ is, for the purpose of this column, a gender-neutral word, and that we always apply the term in a strict political sense; nothing more, nothing less). We call her ‘bembe’, because judging from her brutish rhetoric, this latest addition to the Skettel Circus is a distinct cut, albeit a rough cut, from the same mould as Lady Senator (look like a bembe; walk like a bembe; talk like a bembe!). ‘Loquacious Lisa’ must be quite flattered to know there are other ‘skettels’ (gender-neutral) who actually aspire to be like her.

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Come to think of it, the women in the party are acting and sounding much manlier than the ‘squeaky’ leader. We would wager our last 67 dollars and 30 cents that Rhennae ‘the Nail’ will fully agree with us on that. If you don’t believe us, just do a ‘Spot Check’ from a skewed ‘National Perspective’. 
   
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And since we’ve wandered down that alley, we couldn’t help noticing last week that there’s a full-page ad running in the other party organ, the Filthy Times, titled, “PUP Women Power”. The running of the ad, per se, was no surprise to us because, as we noted some weeks ago, the PUP loves to brag about being the party that is allegedly so inclusive of women; although the women in the party just can’t seem to get along these days (ask Nada and Rhennae ‘the Nail’, or Lady Senator and Lady Chair). But we’ll deal with that another time.

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What we did find particularly surprising about the ad was that ‘Pink Butterfly’ of the Skettel Press (not to be confused with the real Press), the nomadic skettel journalist whom Johnny once fired from his Skettel Vision (also known as CTV 3), the one weh Chendo box from O.W. to San Pedro, and who was recently fired from ‘the Sun’ for being ‘loose’ (floja), was NOT included in the photo op with Lady Chair, Lady Senator and the other female Senator from the South. Although, we did notice that Squeaky’s ‘sibling’ (gender-neutral), Jaime, was smiling SMARTly below. Why in the very same women-power ad? We can’t exactly say, because we didn’t bother to read the details. If Da Noh Soh...  
      
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Da Definitely Soh! And, just as certain, the malice in Sketteldom is bound to erupt again as the fragile truce crumbles under the pressure from fanatics of the old rulers of Sketteldom to have a date be set for the crown to be transferred from one skettel-head to another. We’ll see if and how it plays out; for entertainment only, of course. For now, there is the Skettel Circus which travels from town to town. Have fun!