...are there any ‘sexy’ or especially thought-provoking campaigns that should be more closely watched in the upcoming general election?

Sexy races to watch pt. 1

Consider this


By Philip C. Galanis

The three major political parties have named their entire rosters of 38 candidates for the upcoming general election, which, from all present indications, seems destined for the middle of April to early May.   That is, of course, unless the prime minister decides to irreverently ignore the Lenten season which runs from February 22 to April 8, 2012, something he did in 1997 when general elections were held on March 14.  On that occasion, the FNM won 34 seats to the PLP’s six, establishing the precedent to disregard the Lenten season for political expediency, with no disadvantage to the FNM.

This week we would like to Consider This…given the current compilation of candidates, are there any ‘sexy’ or especially thought-provoking campaigns that should be more closely watched in the upcoming skirmish?  We can think of several and suggest that those worth watching closely are Bamboo Town, Montagu, Fort Charlotte, Long Island, The Exumas and Ragged Island and both Andros seats.

Bamboo Town

Bamboo Town is perhaps the sexiest of all races and is shaping up to be perhaps the most interesting race to watch.  Absolutely none of the candidates now drafted will actually represent the party to which they initially belonged.  They are all transplants.  Branville McCartney, the leader of the newly-formed Democratic National Alliance (DNA) not long ago was a FNM minister.  The Progressive Liberal Party’s (PLP) standard bearer, Renward Wells, until recently, was the leader of the National Development Party (NDP) before joining and being nominated by the PLP.  Before recently joining the FNM, its candidate, Cassius Stuart, was a founding member and the leader of the Bahamas Democratic Movement which was formed in 1998.  Craig Butler, the independent candidate, was an officer of the PLP until recently being denied a nomination by his former party.  So, each of these candidates began his political career wearing other colors.

The person with the most to lose is Branville McCartney, because, as leader of the DNA, if he loses, by convention of the Westminster parliamentary system which we follow, he should resign as that party’s leader.  That scenario would be even more interesting if some of his fellow candidates win their seats and he does not.  Supposedly, the successful candidates, if any, would have to elect a new leader from those who are successful.  In this particular battle, McCartney must have calculated that his former FNM votes could quite likely be cannibalized by the FNM.

There are several important considerations here.  First, in the 2007 election, the PLP did not contest Bamboo Town.  In that election, as presently constituted, the FNM polled 1,261 votes as opposed to independent candidate Tennyson Wells’ 999 votes.  It is reasonable to assume that most of those were cast by PLP supporters who did not have a ‘horse’ in the race.  Secondly, in its present incarnation, Bamboo Town has six polling divisions that were previously in the Kennedy constituency.  In 2007, in those polling divisions, the PLP received 835 votes against the FNM’s 730.  Hence, again as presently constituted, the combined PLP/independent votes would have totaled 1,834 compared to the FNM’s 1,991.

The real test here will be how many of Bran’s FNM voters last time will support him this time around, and will Cassius be able to attract sufficient support to win or will he split the FNM vote which will then work to Renward’s advantage?  And, finally, how well will Craig Butler fare?  Bamboo Town will be the ‘mother of all races’ to watch in 2012.

Montagu

Montagu is also garnering intense interest.  This seat has always been represented by the FNM standard bearer.  The current candidates are Ben Albury (DNA), Richard Lightbourne (FNM), and Frank Smith (PLP).  The most amazing development in this constituency is that, while it is called Montagu, there have been significant changes.  Montagu is now comprised of 12 polling divisions from St. Thomas More, where last time the FNM and PLP polled 1,359 and 1,508 votes, respectively; five polling divisions from Montagu, where the FNM and PLP polled 1,086 and 330 votes, respectively; and one polling division from Marathon where the FNM and PLP polled 81 and 145 votes, respectively.  Based on the total votes cast in 2007, the FNM and PLP polled 2,526 and 1,983 votes, respectively, and assuming that all things remain equal, the FNM would appear to have a decided advantage by 543 votes.

However, Frank Smith has great personal appeal with an effective ground campaign and superlative ‘street smarts’, while Richard Lightbourne is generally perceived to be a lackluster candidate.  The spoiler factor here will be important because Ben Albury is also a very attractive candidate and will likely cannibalize FNM votes.  Despite the apparent FNM advantage here, this contest will have more to do with personal appeal and voter connectivity than brand loyalty.  This will be a fascinating race to follow.

Fort Charlotte

Fort Charlotte will be another very interesting race.  The veteran Zhivargo Laing (FNM), and newcomers Dr. Andre Rollins (PLP) and Mark Humes, chairman of the DNA, will contest that seat, which is presently represented by Alfred Sears (PLP).  This constituency is also now a composite of most of the polling divisions of Fort Charlotte (nine polling divisions or parts thereof), two polling divisions from Killarney and a part of Killarney polling division number two.  Based on the 2007 election results, as presently constituted, last time the FNM and PLP polled 1,637 and 1,700 votes, respectively.  These figures do not include the parts of the polling divisions that have been changed.

While this race should be won by the PLP it is too close to call particularly given the campaign experience of the FNM’s veteran candidate, albeit he was rejected in Fort Charlotte in 2002, versus the rookie factor of the PLP and DNA candidates.  Furthermore, it can be reasonably assumed that regardless of the reason for Zhivargo’s move from Marco City in Freeport to Fort Charlotte, Ingraham has made a calculated wager that he would like to ensure a victory for his “erstwhile son” – a victory that was questionable in Marco City.

Conclusion

The prime minister realizes that if he is to form the next government, he has to keep Bamboo Town and Montagu in the FNM win column and would like to increase his number by adding Fort Charlotte, particularly because he believes that he will lose ground in Grand Bahama given his government’s dismal performance there and that island’s anemic economic profile during the last five years.

Next week, we will review the prospects for the ‘sexy’ and significant races on Andros, on which the prime minister has publically declared he has set his sights, Long Island, and The Exumas and Ragged Island.

Jan 30, 2012

thenassauguardian

Sexy races to watch pt.2

Caribbean Blog International

Branville McCartney - Democratic National Alliance (DNA) leader's gross error in judgement in relations to his party’s MICAL candidate, Delano Munroe ...who is facing a criminal charge... ...stealing by reason of employment...

The DNA leader’s mistake

thenassauguardian editorial

Branville McCartney, leader of the Democratic National Alliance (DNA), is new to politics.  He is just finishing his first term as a member of Parliament.  Yet, he leads a party which hopes to have a permanent presence in The Bahamas.

In a story in The Nassau Guardian on Wednesday the DNA leader admitted that he knew that his party’s MICAL candidate, Delano Munroe, was facing a criminal charge when Munroe was made a candidate by the party.  Munroe has been charged with stealing by reason of employment.

All individuals are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law in our country.  Munroe should be allowed to defend his name in court and should not be in frontline politics while this matter is pending.  McCartney should know this.  He is an attorney, a MP and a party leader.

“We are looking into it and we will make a statement once we have looked into it further,” said McCartney on Wednesday.

He said the party will determine the future of Munroe’s candidacy pending the investigation and the eventual outcome of the court case.

Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham and Opposition Leader Perry Christie have been in the House of Assembly since 1977.  They have been MPs for parts of five different decades.  A component of McCartney’s appeal to some voters is that he is a ‘fresh face’.

The major criticism of McCartney, however, is that he does not have the experience to be prime minister.  Consequently, those who are considering voting for his fledgling party are evaluating all of his decisions to determine if this criticism is true or not.  Selecting and keeping Munroe as a candidate does not engender trust among these potential supporters of the DNA.

Running candidates with complicated lives can cost votes.  In the 2007 general election the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) ran Shane Gibson after embarrassing pictures of Gibson and Anna Nicole Smith in an embrace were published in The Tribune.  Gibson won his Golden Gates seat, but the PLP lost the election.

The Free National Movement (FNM) has continued to attack Gibson since 2007 on his record as the minister of housing in the last PLP administration, questioning his administration of the affairs of the ministry.  Yet, the PLP has nominated Gibson again to be a candidate in the 2012 general election.

Reasonable observers would agree that the Anna Nicole photos caused the PLP great embarrassment and votes.  The PLP, for some reason, sticks with Gibson.  We are not saying that he did anything wrong.  In politics some people simply become liabilities because of negative voter perception of the issues they face.  Leaders who cannot ensure that these individuals serve from behind-the-scenes, or not at all, demonstrate that they are either not strong enough to make this happen or that they are out of touch with the public mood.

McCartney has made a mistake.  He should inform Munroe that he should take a break from the frontline until the matter is resolved.  If cleared of the charge, Munroe would be able to reenter frontline politics and state his case as a potential political candidate.

Jan 27, 2012

thenassauguardian editorial

Caribbean Blog International

If doctors and politicians want to attract medical tourism to The Bahamas, they need first to inspire confidence in Bahamian medical services among Bahamians themselves... ...Putting the legislation that already exists to work on behalf of the public interest by providing quality assurance and oversight of healthcare delivery is the obvious place to start

A question of medical trust

Tough Call - tribune242



IN a recent Tribune article, heart specialist Dr Conville Brown complained about Bahamians spending millions of dollars in the US for medical care that could easily be obtained at home.
He was arguing in favour of local healthcare providers building a large-scale medical tourism industry.

"The same things that all tourists do," he said, "the medical tourist has to do. (And) if the ownership is Bahamian, then the economy really wins because those funds will stay here."
But at the same time, he felt constrained to point out that Bahamians were offsetting the income from foreigners by flying off to get treatment in the US.

"We boost their economy big time. We are reverse medical tourists. Several hospitals in South Florida say their biggest international clientele is from the Bahamas."

Medical tourism is a multi-billion-dollar growth industry that hospitals, doctors and tourism marketers around the world are eager to tap into. By some accounts, more than half a million Americans travel to other countries for medical treatment - partly for cost reasons and partly to take advantage of procedures not yet approved in the US.

There can be no disagreement with Dr Brown's position in terms of the Bahamian economy. And for patients, the benefits are equally obvious and compelling. If Bahamians obtained their medical treatment at home, they would significantly reduce the logistics, expense and stress of being treated abroad.

Why then, do so many of us spend so much money overseas for treatments that are available right here at home? We can answer that question fairly confidently - given a choice, patients will seek medical care from the doctors, hospitals and clinics they trust the most.

This is a personal decision, and it is usually an informed decision. Patients must feel assured that the doctors and facilities they choose are both accountable and able to provide the best quality care they can afford.

So what processes do we have in place to convey such assurances to Bahamians?
Well, there are three statutory bodies that are capable of providing quality assurance and oversight to the Bahamian healthcare sector.

The Public Health Authority has managed government hospitals and clinics since 1999, under the direction of the Minister of Health. As an independent public body, the Authority is responsible for planning, policy, monitoring, evaluation, and management, as well as programme development and oversight.

However, the PHA's legislation has no provision for the investigation of complaints about the healthcare facilities managed by the Authority. Instead, PHA patients are advised to contact the "patient representative" to discuss any concerns they may have.

The Hospital and Health Care Facilities Board was created by Parliament in 1998 to license private hospitals and clinics. This legislation does include a specific mandate to investigate complaints into the "diagnosis, management and treatment" of any patient.

Physicians are the primary providers of healthcare, whether in the public or private sector, and since 1974 they have been licensed and regulated by the Medical Council. According to its website, the council was established "to regulate the medical profession, to upgrade doctors through continuing education requirements, and to safeguard the public through receiving and disposing of complaints".
However, despite the fact that it represents one of the richest professions, the council is made up of a handful of volunteers with virtually no administrative staff. Their website, for example, includes dead and departed physicians on its registry.

So do the records of these three bodies help to inspire confidence and trust in the delivery of healthcare services in the Bahamas?

Well, it would be useful to know how many complaints have been processed by the PHA's "patient representative" and how they were resolved, but unfortunately that information is not publicly available. As for the Hospital Board and the Medical Council, a summary of the case history of one complaint to these bodies over the past decade is instructive.

In 2004, a complaint was made to the Hospital Board concerning the treatment of a 42-year-old man who unexpectedly died in 2002 in a licensed Bahamian healthcare facility.

The board initially refused to deal with the complaint. But after several board members were replaced in 2005 by then Health Minister Dr Marcus Bethel, he ordered that the complaint be investigated. This order by Dr Bethel more than six years ago is the high-point of the case.

The 2005 board met with the complainant's legal and medical representatives in 2006. Afterwards, the Board chairman advised that "since the patient was dead, the file should be closed."

The board did, however, reconsider, and an investigatory panel was to be formed. However, the government changed before this happened.

The new government reinstated the 2004 board chairman, and other members. This chairman reported to a Rotary Club meeting in 2008 that the board didn't want to investigate any complaints, or "be involved in that detailed level of work".

The board said it would seek to have its enabling legislation amended, to remove the investigative requirements, and also to remove the requirement for licensed facilities to report deaths occurring on their premises - a legal mandate never complied with, and never enforced, over the board's entire lifetime.

(It should also be noted that over the past 14 years the board has issued only two "annual" reports to Parliament, something which it is required to do by law every year. And even obtaining copies of those two reports presents enormous challenges).

At a public meeting in 2008, Health Minister Dr Hubert Minnis also promised to investigate the 2004 complaint. But it is now 2012 and the board has taken no action whatsoever. Neither has it ever responded to the complainant.

As for the Medical Council, it received a complaint about the same patient's treatment and care in 2008. The disciplinary committee of the Medical Council met twice on the matter, and three years ago, then council chairman Dr Duane Sands assured Tough Call that: "There is no stonewalling. We take this very, very seriously because we want to ensure that the public will be well-served at the end of the day by this groundbreaking precedent."

He also told me that the medical act (which has been stalled for almost a decade now) was being strengthened to deal with "a finite group of people who are discrediting the profession without any real repercussions - from charging extortionary fees to providing less than appropriate care".
However, in December of last year, the Medical Council's disciplinary committee suspended the 2004 complaint investigation indefinitely.

The council decided it could not proceed because of an ex-parte injunction granted by a Supreme Court judge against the disciplinary committee in 2009, on the application of a doctor concerned in the matter. Since then, the Medical Council has taken no steps either to have the injunction removed or to proceed with the investigation.

The injunction itself is a curious feature in this story. It is perhaps "the one and only" injunction to be granted by one Supreme Court judge against another Supreme Court judge (who sits in his judicial capacity as a member of the statutory disciplinary committee).

Kerzner's branding of the Ocean Club as the "One and Only" has given a high profile to the Bahamas as an attractive destination, but the "one and only" injunction against a Supreme Court judge could have a converse affect on the Bahamas as a destination for medical tourism - quite apart from the collateral damage inflicted on the public oversight function of the Medical Council.

If doctors and politicians want to attract medical tourism to the Bahamas, they need first to inspire confidence in Bahamian medical services among Bahamians themselves. Putting the legislation that already exists to work on behalf of the public interest by providing quality assurance and oversight of healthcare delivery is the obvious place to start.

* What do you think? Send comments to larry@tribunemedia.net or visit bahamapundit.com.

January 25, 2012

tribune242

Caribbean Blog International

The Bahamas is among a group of Caribbean countries that suffers from a nursing deficiency... ...Health Minister Dr. Hubert Minnis expects the nurse shortage to worsen

Health minister expects nurse shortage to worsen


By Krystel Rolle
Guardian Staff Reporter
krystel@nasgaurd.com

Nearly two years after a World Bank report named The Bahamas among a group of Caribbean countries that suffers from a nursing deficiency, Health Minister Dr. Hubert Minnis acknowledged that the problem still persists and will likely do so for years to come.

In fact, the problem has existed for so long that hospitals and clinics in The Bahamas have become accustomed to working with a shortage of nurses.

“We are going to be plagued with that problem for a long time. That’s not going to be solved by this government and that’s not going to be solved by the next,” Dr. Minnis told The Nassau Guardian yesterday.

“There’s a shortage not only in The Bahamas. It’s a shortage throughout the world. By the year 2015 the United States will be short by 250,000 nurses.”

He said this will place added stress on Caribbean countries as well as many other countries across the globe.

According to the study, 'The Nurse Labor and Education Markets in the English-speaking CARICOM -  Issues and Options for Reform', the region is facing a rapidly growing shortage of nurses as demand for quality health care increases due to an aging population, and high numbers of nurses emigrate, drawn by higher paying jobs in Canada, the UK and the USA.

Dr. Minnis said the problem is expected to get even worse in the coming years as Bahamian nurses will likely migrate to the United States where nursing jobs are readily available.

Pointing to the severity of The Bahamas' shortage, Dr. Minnis said The Bahamas has 26 nurses to every 10,000 people, while countries like the United States have 100 nurses per 10,000 people.

“We are short; that’s why we continue to address the issue by having students train through The College of The Bahamas. In addition to paying for their education, the government gives them a monthly salary. So we are doing all we can,” Dr. Minnis added.

The World Bank said in the coming years, demand for nurses in the English-speaking Caribbean will increase due to the health needs of the aging population.

To meet the demand for nurses in the English-speaking Caribbean, the report suggests Caribbean countries increase training capacity; manage migration; strengthen data quality and availability and adopt a regional approach.

But Dr. Minnis said there is not much more the government can do.

“Like physicians, with nursing there are a lot of new specialities and therefore as they arise you will continue to have shortages because they will move into the various specialties, which means that you may have deficiencies with the generalists and the specialty nurses.”

Jan 25, 2012
thenassauguardian

Caribbean Blog International

The shareholding society Hubert Ingraham has sought to encourage is a direct link to the progressive aspirations of those who struggled for majority rule... ...This is an inconvenient truth for the doom and gloom crowd, Ingraham’s opponents ...and those who believe that they have a copyright on majority rule

Hubert Ingraham’s Quiet Revolution

Front Porch

“The Bahamas Achieves a Quiet Revolution as Its First Black Government Takes Hold” was the headline of a New York Times story announcing the achievement of majority rule in the Colony of the Bahama Islands in 1967.

The story began: “A quiet revolution has been achieved in these resort islands as a Negro government has taken office this week to end three centuries of white rule.  The impact has been nil on the tourists who have packed Nassau's hotels, but the changeover seems to have touched the heart of every Negro citizen.”

By quiet, it did not mean that the movement for majority rule was quiescent or a laid back struggle.  The word quiet speaks to the nonviolent nature of the fight for the second emancipation in Bahamian history.

In newspaper editorials and columns, from pulpits and on talk radio, we continue to read or hear the trite and factually wrong gibberish masquerading as commentary that The Bahamas has dramatically regressed in relation to the aspirations of majority rule.

This decline meme has variations, but in all versions the sky is falling or getting ready to fall.  This is accompanied by the requisite wailing and gnashing of the teeth by those who have little sense of irony or historical perspective beyond their nose and the morning newspapers.

 

Doom and gloom

That these prophets of doom and gloom are even able to spin and spew their poorly reasoned viewpoints from the vantage point of a pulpit, a free broadcast media or writing in a newspaper is testament to the legacy of majority rule.

Moreover, those black Bahamians including black women, able to offer such opinions and who enjoy the privilege of an advanced degree and notable professional status might wish to recall that without majority rule little or none of their success would be possible.

Like all great movements, the legacy of majority rule is mixed.  There are noticeable and continuing successes.  In other areas there is much work to be done.  Majority rule was about political, social and economic empowerment.

As noted last week, many of the progressives in the struggle for majority rule appreciated that attaining political power would be relatively easier than wrestling economic power from entrenched interests.

Moreover, surprisingly, the early ambitions of some of these progressives to dismantle the economic monopolies of the Bay Street Boys were thwarted by their more reactionary colleagues in the fight for a majority government.

Yet on the eve of the 45th anniversary of majority rule, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham announced that his government was nearing the final stages of the dismantling of the near monopolistic control of the port business by a few families.  These families included some of those Bay Street Boys from whom political power had to be wrestled.

Ingraham has added his own chapter to the Quiet Revolution.  He has dismantled many decades of entrenched economic domination in port ownership in New Providence.  He is also transferring some of that wealth and the opportunity for wealth-creation to the Bahamian people.

For some time, Ingraham has been building a shareholding society as a means of broadening and deepening ownership in the economy by Bahamians and especially so by a broader cross section of Bahamians.

During his first term in office the government made 49 percent of the shares of the Bank of The Bahamas available to the Bahamian public.  When the funding for the second Paradise Island Bridge was done it was through the issuance of Treasury Bonds which were made available to the general public.

 

Good investment

The introduction of cable television provided another opportunity for Bahamians to buy shares that have proven to be a good investment.  Today, Cable Bahamas is fully Bahamian-owned.

When the Bahamians who owned the majority stake in Commonwealth Brewery sought the approval of the Ingraham administration to sell their controlling interests to a foreign company, the approval was conditional.  It was conditional on Heineken, the new owners, making 25 percent of the shares in the company available to the Bahamians.

With the new port on Arawak Cay, Bahamians will have the opportunity to purchase shares in a potentially lucrative venture.  Some of the same white merchant elite who held political power prior to majority rule also controlled many of the country’s lucrative enterprise including the port.  These included families with surnames like Kelly, Symonette and Bethel.

The surnames of those who can now own shares in the Arawak Port Development (APD) will run the gamut from A to Z in the telephone directory.  Members of the Mailboat Association will also own shares in the port development.

Civil servants will be afforded the opportunity to buy shares in APD through salary deductions.  Those who mindlessly claim that little progress continues to be made in the advancement of the aspirations of majority rule may wish to suspend their commentary long enough to purchase some shares.

Perhaps they can also suspend their insipid rhetoric long enough to talk to the thousands of ordinary Bahamians who now own shares in various Bahamian enterprises including cable and banking, and soon at BTC.

The shareholding society Hubert Ingraham has sought to encourage is a direct link to the progressive aspirations of those who struggled for majority rule.  This is an inconvenient truth for the doom and gloom crowd, Ingraham’s opponents, and those who believe that they have a copyright on majority rule.

frontporchguardian@gmail.com

www.bahamapundit.com

Jan 24, 2012

thenassauguardian

Caribbean Blog International

...at the end of the day, workers will be laid off if the Atlantis resort performs poorly... just like in 2008 with the onset of the global financial crisis

Politics and the Atlantis deal


By PACO NUNEZ
Tribune News Editor


As is to be expected at this advanced stage in the election cycle, every issue with potential political mileage is going to be spun for all it's worth.

Just so with the collapse of the Atlantis ownership transfer deal. Mr Christie says Mr Ingraham should have been more forthcoming about the details, Mr Ingraham says Mr Christie's poor decisions in office created the conditions that led to the deal in the first place, and Branville McCartney says both men knew the proposal was bad for Bahamians, but kept this information from the public.

And, in another clear indicator of the times, even while politicking their hearts out Messrs Christie and McCartney have both sought to give the impression they are the only straight talker; the one not using the failed deal as a political stick to beat the others with.

The PLP leader has provided us with perhaps the most amusing quote, a classic example of political doublespeak.

Berating the Prime Minister for "playing politics" as the deal collapsed, Mr Christie said: "Atlantis is the nation's single largest private employer and thousands of Bahamian jobs are at stake."

Then: "We're told he found out on Friday that the Brookfield deal was going under. Did he tell the people of the Bahamas? Did he call union leaders or meet with workers? Did he start reviewing options for moving forward? No."

Let's see if we can follow his logic. The issue is too sensitive and too important for the Prime Minister to continue with politics-as-usual. To prove this, Mr Christie tries to scare the hell out of everyone ("thousands of Bahamian jobs are at stake"), then uses his alarmist interpretation to criticise the behaviour of his political opponent.

A political jab, disguised as a warning about making political jabs. Did Mr Christie think no one would see through his crafty trick?

His version is alarmist and inflammatory, because anyone with the merest hint of business sense - and I'm sure that includes Mr Christie - knows two facts to be true.

The first is that there is nothing the government can do at this stage about the underlying factors: Kerzner's inability to pay its creditors and the decision of those creditors to call in their loans.

The DNA may well be right, the deal would not have been ideal for the Bahamas; nevertheless, it was the only one on the table. What should the government have done, allow the largest private sector employer in the country to go bankrupt? Stage a $2.3 billion bail-out?

Fact

The second, more important fact, is that contrary to Mr Christie's assertions, the failure of the Brookfield deal has in no way rewritten the future for Atlantis workers.

That's not to say everything will necessarily be fine in the long-run, only that the probability it will has not been improved or worsened by the collapse of the deal.

This is especially the case, as while the transaction was scuppered by two junior creditors, the major players were all onboard, meaning a revised proposal with relatively minor changes could see the deal resurrected soon.

So, at the end of the day, workers will be laid off if the resort performs poorly - just like in 2008 with the onset of the global financial crisis.

If Atlantis does well, people will keep their jobs. Simple as that.

Now, no one is naive enough to believe the going will be easy; the creditors will expect hefty profit margins. After all, they're in it to get their money back.

But an essential ingredient in this formula is the product, which attracts the guests in the first place, and the new owners will know an understaffed resort is the fastest route to falling standards.

So, is it merely a case of much ado about nothing? Not quite.

What all the political gauze of the last week or so has managed to do, is obscure the real lesson of this "crisis" - the extent to which the notion has become imbedded in our collective psyche that as goes Atlantis, so goes the Bahamas.

The anxiety unleashed by this turn of events exposed how inextricably intertwined our sense of national well-being has become with the fate of a single entity.

Even those violently opposed to the pink monstrosity across the bridge have been lulled over the years into the assumption of its permanence, its inevitability.

Leaving aside arguments about whether the nature of our economy would have allowed for any realistic alternative, can it be healthy for a society to pin all its hopes on a single business, the ultimate fate of which is decided beyond our shores?

Of course, this leads us into a consideration of what the Bahamas would be today if Sol Kerzner had never come here in the first place.

When 800 workers were laid off from Atlantis in 2008, there was widespread concern that it would spark a crime wave. What would the other 8,000 employees be doing right now if history had taken a different course?

What other cracks in our society have been papered over by the existence of a mega-resort which just as easily, might never have been?

* What do you think?

Email: pnunez@tribunemedia.net

January 23, 2012

tribune242

Caribbean Blog International

As we all sit and evaluate the political parties and independent candidates who will offer for public office in the run-up to the 2012 general election... we should make every effort to determine if there is someone on the ballot good enough to vote for...

Does it matter if you vote?

thenassauguardian editorial

Interesting debates always emerge when the question is posed as to whether or not citizens living in democracies should feel obligated to vote.

Most democracies were fought for.  People who campaigned for freedom, self-governance and civil rights were jailed; some were murdered; some were beaten and many others were victimized.  Some of these fights were actual wars.

In this context, we all should take the vote seriously.  It is not a right, but a gift fought for by those who came before us.

As we all sit and evaluate the political parties and independent candidates who will offer for public office in the run-up to the next general election, we should make every effort to determine if there is someone on the ballot good enough to vote for.

Those who do not think there is anyone good enough to vote for should consider entering the race or the political process.

But if the ballot is filled with poor candidates, what should a voter do?  Should voters feel compelled to vote?

No, they should not.  Voting is an important part of the democratic process.  However, voting should not be confused with democracy.  Democracy is about self-governance.  As citizens, we have a responsibility to do this everyday – not just every five years.

By working at a charity, providing assistance to the homeless, democracy is at work;  by volunteering as a mentor at a school, democracy is at work; by raising an educated, hardworking law-abiding citizen, democracy is at work.

So for those who think there is no reasonable offering to vote for at the next general election, you should rest assured that there are many other ways to participate in the advancement and governance of The Bahamas.

A group of residents in a community can easily come together, approach their public school, and start an after-school literacy program for the children falling behind, for example.

Simple initiatives such as these, if done by many individuals or by many groups, can do much to change the lives of the disadvantaged and the soon-to-be lost.

Elections are important; voting is important.  But if you think the mainstream political parties are pathetic and the independents are incompetent, do not distress.  You can exercise your democratic power everyday by doing something to help build the community.

Jan 21, 2012

thenassauguardian editorial

Caribbean Blog International