YEAR OF HOPE As another new year dawns on a world that has been ravaged by a nearly two years long pandemic, our hopes must now lie in a period of transition perhaps where COVID-19 gradually acquires ‘endemic status’ rather than disappear off the face of the planet – that isn’t likely to transpire until new variants such as Omicron stop surfacing from seemingly nowhere and a large majority of world citizens are fully immunised. Here at home meanwhile, the virus has suddenly moved down the scale of burning issues as the nation grapples with multiple – mostly homegrown – crises of which the forex crunch, the perilous state of external finances and dwindling reserves, questions over our ability to repay the continually accumulating debt, and even the ignominy of being deprived of essential services such as power and gas supplies hold sway. And to cap it all, the people of our precious land are compelled to watch the horror show we call ‘politics’ as our politicians continue to use every opportunity (in this instance, the tsunami of calamities!) to either hang on to power or manoeuvre with a view to grabbing it. Whether there is a silver lining on what is the darkest of horizons is a matter of conjecture – so much so that hope could well be all we have left.