The elders' vote

TWO million elders capable of wielding the vote but with no candidate to take up their cause. This is the deplorable situation in which our elders find themselves.

Is this our sense of priorities as a people, presumably steeped in religious and cultural traditions which attach topmost priority to the care and reverence for parents and elders?

The impression is inescapable on reading the observations made by Legal Aid Commission Chairman S.S. Wijeratne at an Elders' Day seminar that despite the lip service we pay to caring for the elders and the infirm, the latter, whose numbers are increasing steadily, are taken for granted.

For instance, there is no mention by our Presidential contenders on what they intend to do for the benefit of our elders or what policy action is contemplated by them for our elders although two million of the latter could cast their votes at the forthcoming election.

We believe the "sting" came at the tail end of the Legal Aid Commission Chairman's address. The elderly population of the country, he said, must be taken out of the charity agenda to the development agenda of the State.

True, the motive should not be to treat our elders as an object of charity. This would only degrade them as would charity do to most recipients.

The aim should be to make elders active contributors to the common good. Besides, investments should be made towards bringing out the best in them. The greying and aging population should be treated as an asset, in other words, rather than as a liability.

However, the practice right now is to consider them a liability and to make them languish in the most depressing conditions. Incorporating elders in the mainstream of national life would amount to bringing them into the development agenda.

What needs to be scrupulously avoided is a fatalistic attitude towards the ageing population. Advancement in years does not necessarily mean decline and decay.

There is a vast multitude of neurons in the human brain which is waiting to be effectively used. Most humans use only a fraction of these during their life-time. The rest is disposed along with the dead human.

However, the human should be schooled in the skills of using these neurons and this task should begin when a human is young and prolonged throughout his life.

These skills should be heightened during old age when the prolonged non-use of the mind very often gives way to disabilities such as Senile Decay.

Therefore, we wish to remind our Presidential candidates that they are duty bound to tell us what policy they would be adopting towards our ageing population which is growing by the day.

An inability to do this would betray a policy lacuna which in turn would make a mockery of our professions to being a civilized people.

Our politicians, very many of whom are 60 years or more, should think seriously about these issue areas because double standards should not be adopted towards vulnerable groups, such as our elders. All sections of the old need to be treated with the same yardstick and provided the same facilities.

These issues should be probed with the utmost seriousness because time is fast running out. Quite a few elders are not winning ready succour from even their children.

Many of them end up in elders' homes and this is not an ideal situation although a number of organisations - both State and non-State-provide well for their inmates.

We believe it would be in order to upgrade and strengthen the National Council of Elders, because a dynamic State agency is a vital requirement at the present juncture.

We are afraid such duties cannot be left at the mercy of market forces because caring for the vulnerable is a duty of the State and such care testifies to the vibrancy of a democracy.