Bahama Pundit

On Print and Power

by Nicolette Bethel

There's an email making the rounds (I received it several months ago) entitled "Blacks Don't Read". Being Black, I read it. The general message of the email is simple and thought-provoking: one of the reasons African-Americans are still second-class citizens in their country is that they don't read.

The email isn't talking about illiteracy. It's talking about choosing not to read when one could choose to do so. And it's arguing that the consequences of making such a choice are, fundamentally, political.

In 2000, I sat down to watch a special episode of A&E's Biography on the 100 most influential people of the millennium: politicians, inventors, writers, artists, composers, religious leaders, soldiers. One by one the people I considered likely to be at the top of the list were eliminated, until at last I was stumped: who would be named the most influential person of the last thousand years? The answer: Johannes Gutenberg, inventor of the printing press.

Background to the Grand Bahama Port Authority Dispute

by Larry Smith

Grand Bahama was a wilderness to early visitors. An English circuit magistrate wrote in 1887 that the island's population of 700 "can barely exist."

In 1934, another visitor described the island as "a lost child of the colony...Travelling up Hawksbill Creek among the mangroves is a picturesque adventure, but getting ashore thereabouts has its difficulties."

That picture did not change much until August 1955, when the government leased 80 square miles on Grand Bahama to an American named Wallace Groves who had been running a lumber operation there. In return, Groves undertook to make Hawksbill Creek a deep-water port and carve a new township out of the pine barren.

That land grant was later increased to about 200 square miles and the tax concessions extended until 2054. Freeport was, you might say, the ultimate anchor project. And although the original idea was to establish an industrial centre, by the early 1960s the emphasis had switched to the familiar resort-residential model of development.

Lawyer Threatens Grand Bahama Port Authority For Negligence

by Larry Smith

Freeport lawyer Fred Smith is threatening to sue the Grand Bahama Port Authority, on behalf of licensees and landowners, for failing "to act as a responsible municipal, administrative, regulatory and development authority, and to develop, maintain and improve the physical infrastructure and amenities."

Smith represents the widow of the late Edward St George (who was co-chairman of the Port Authority for over 22 years until his death in December 2004) in a legal dispute with Sir Jack Hayward (the other co-chairman) over ownership of the Port companies. A Supreme Court ruling on that dispute is expected on August 30.

On August 24 Smith delivered a letter to the Port Authority, the Grand Bahama Development Company, the Lucaya Service Company and the court-appointed receivers who are supervising Port business pending a resolution of the ownership dispute.

The letter points out a number of issues affecting the future of Freeport that need to be addressed. Extensive excerpts are quoted here:

Election Madness Continues in the Bahamas

by Craig Butler

The general election has been over for almost four months and we are still suffering from election fever.

The PLP have every right to seek to advance their constitutional rights in the courts and clearly they intend to do so. We know that the dates for the three cases have been set, and based on the number of witnesses that are going to have to be called in each matter it is estimated that we will probably be embroiled in this saga for the next year at least.

To complicate things, the issue of Malcolm Adderley retaining his chairmanship of the Gaming Board has tongues a-wagging that the FNM is courting him to cross the aisle. If that turned out to be the case then despite the outcome of the cases the FNM would retain the government in any event.

There has been much talk from many circles that the prime minister does not have the moral authority to call a snap election. Presumably this refers to the fact that the election court has yet to rule on matters which could cause a change of government.

On Self-Publication (a Meditation)

by Nicolette Bethel

I’m pleased to announce that I’m working preparing Essays on Life for publication in a series of books. The first one, featuring the first fifty essays published, is almost ready to go to print. In a week or so, I hope, if all goes well, it’ll be available online. Within the month, again if all goes well, I’m hoping it can be available in local bookstores.

Sound too good to be true? Well it is, sort of. The process of publication never used to be so quick and easy in the past. And easy doesn't always mean good. But here's the raw truth. After plenty of thought (and some trepidation), and after considering things like time and cost and bulk and other stuff, I decided to self-publish. And I've chosen an online service that will print and bind and ship the book for me.

Police Gifts, the Nassau Port, and Internet Regulation - It's the Silly Season

by Larry Smith

We know it's the silly season, but that doesn't mean that big grown men in very senior and super responsible positions should suddenly take leave of their senses.

I mean, what was Assistant Police Commissioner Ellison Greenslade's brain on when he publicly accepted gifts worth tens of thousands of dollars just for being transferred from Freeport to Nassau. A few more transfers like that and Greenslade could retire comfortably without even touching his pension.

And what were his fellow police officers (who allegedly provided the gifts) thinking when they pulled out their wallets to buy a luxury car, his and her Rolex watches, and an expensive pair of cell phones for their ex-boss. Or did they 'solicit' the gifts from grateful businessmen?

Just before the election, we were hearing that police officers were underpaid and overworked. But apparently those in Freeport either have plenty of extra cash to buy luxury goods, or plenty of free time to solicit them. Too bad Greenslade wasn't also a reverend - he could probably have received a vacation villa to boot.

And then, after accepting the gifts, Greenslade and others have the astounding lack of judgement to actually offer a public defense. How can a senior police officer justify accepting such valuable gifts for simply doing a job? The whole episode is weirdly reminiscent of the time when Sir Lynden Pindling was presented with a Rolls Royce from "PLP supporters", as well as $16,000 in $100 bills from his poor South Andros constituents, just for being prime minister.

On Raisins and the Sun

by Nicolette Bethel

I'm sitting in Starbucks, listening to a jazz rendition of "Sponger Money". I must admit it sounds good. And it feels good to hear an international take on a Bahamian song. But I'm also wondering a couple of things.

The first one is what the thing is called. Is it called "Sponger Money" on the label, or does it have a different title -- Spanish, maybe, or something unrelated in English?

The second one is who the song is said to be by. Now I don't know the answer to that one, as I have not done the research necessary to find out who wrote it. I can hazard a guess -- perhaps it was Charles Lofthouse, who wrote several songs in the first part of the twentieth century. More likely, it was an anonymous person, maybe a man on a sponge boat, or a woman clipping sponges on the wharf. I do know of at least one person who arranged the song: my father, E. Clement Bethel.

The third one (correct, this is a Bahamian "couple"), intimately connected to the first two, is who's getting the royalties for the song.

Bahamian Immigration Problems

by Craig Butler

I don’t know if any of us who were born here and consider ourselves to be proud Bahamians really understand what predicament some of our compatriots find themselves in. Not only don’t we understand but many of us are also completely unsympathetic.

Like the outside child (and I use this analogy because many could identify with it) who never feels complete acceptance from the legitimate siblings, but who is also not responsible for the situation in which they find themselves, we treat the children of illegal immigrants with contempt and disdain.

Other countries have adopted a much more liberal approach to those that are born within their boarders, and many Bahamians can personally attest to this as they go to South Florida to have their children so that they may have the benefit of being American citizens.

However when the children of (particularly) Haitians and Jamaicans who are born here seek to assert their rights many of us would wish to see them fail. It is a shame that they only have the right to apply for Bahamian citizenship on reaching the age of majority - meaning there is no guarantee that they will receive it.

On Patronage

by Nicolette Bethel

In the opening of the film The Godfather, Don Vito Corleone is visited by Johnny Fantone, a young singer who is trying to make a name for himself in Hollywood. Don Corleone has already helped Johnny to get where he is in Las Vegas, having made his band leader the offer he couldn't refuse. Now Don Corleone agrees to help him break into movies. Everyone who has seen that film knows what happens next: the blood in the bed, the terror in the night. Don Corleone has ways of getting what he wants.

Now The Godfather is a movie, and what's in it may not be the exact truth. But what interests me today is not so much the glamour or the horror of specific incidents, or even the tragedy inherent in those who (like Michael Corleone) are destined to be Dons, but the circumstances in which mafia-like organizations arise.

Bahamian Politicos Should Eschew Partisan Histrionics and Work on National Agenda

by Larry Smith

In the end you've got to use power for the purpose of making change - Alistair Campbell, Tony Blair's former press secretary.

God is in charge of the Bahamas - radio caller.

Thanks to the deity, no doubt, it is still possible to enjoy a comfortable life in the Bahamas despite signs of an impending social tipping point. But frankly, when we do reach that point it's hard to say whether we will be able to regain our balance.

Of course, it can be argued that we have been there and done that before. Prior to the economic take-off in the 1960s, the Bahamas was a dreadfully poor and undeveloped place. And despite brief spurts of prosperity since the end of slavery 173 years ago, generally these islands were not a desirable place to live and many simply gave up and moved on.

Emigration peaked around the time of the First World War when there were less than 60,000 people living here, and right after the Second World War thousands of Bahamians worked as migrant labourers in the US because there was not enough to do at home. Stultifying social and racial barriers were not dismantled until the reform movement of the 1960s won power.

Belying early expectations, those reformers congealed into another entrenched oligarchy. And during the 1980s a venal Pindling regime presided over the corruption of our entire society - emasculating dissent, mismanaging the economy and selling us out to foreign gangsters. Predictably, this led to a dramatic rise in lawlessness, substance abuse and economic woe.