Rough Cut,
By Felix F. Bethel
“…is still me…”
The Bahama Journal
Pindling told me to tell you that no matter who is nominally in charge of today’s Bahamas; is still me – Ping- who is large and in charge.
Here I tell no lie when I tell you that, Pindling himself gave me this message via dream pumped in from God-Knows- Where.
Indeed, just the other night, I had a long series of talks with Pindling.
Not only were these conversations with the Chief long; but in truth, they were all quite strange in that when I talked to him, I got the impression that while I was seeing and hearing and talking with him as one man could ever talk to another, I was quite convinced that somehow or the other, I had figured out how to cross over, have conversations not only with him but also with some of my friends, like Chris Symonnet, who –some years ago – made that cross-life journey to where God-Knows-Where.
Now since, just this morning, I woke to find myself still clothed in a semblance of my right mind, I must conclude that, I did the crossing over; that I did speak to Pindling and Chris and some other people – some of whom I know are currently half-dead.
Incidentally, that happens- you can be half-dead and of course, your demented parents can beat you half to death in their paranoia induced decision that since you are their child, they could go to heroic lengths to beat the devil out of you.
And so they tried with me.
Just the other night; that is to say just the night after one of my boys came back from a journey to a far country; I dreamed a dream; and in that dream, I found myself in the company of a mighty host of people who –interestingly- must have already been dead and gone a long time ago.
In the dream, I recognized Pindling and strangely, the old man recognized me.
Indeed I had the awesome task of presenting and introducing the beloved Pindling to a number of the people he helped make; and so in the dream I dreamed, I saw men and women in a host of guises and disguises.
These men and women – some of them now dead and gone – were alive enough in the dream I dreamed; and strangely while in the dream, Pindling was real enough to me and alive enough to me; in the dream I dreamed, no one but your beloved professor could hear or see him.
Here I can tell you that in one set of encounters that took place in the dream I had, I remember Pindling’s insight to the effect that while he might be gone in the flesh; what he had left behind on the ground in the Bahamas had now come to full fruition and flourish.
And perhaps thus: the arrival of the Aga Khan; the mercilessness of poverty and the plethora of deaths throughout our country and Kerzner and Baha Mar and the opening to Cuba and the opening to China and the wider Pacific; and the deepening of ties to the Caribbean and to the pomp and pageantry that comes with being King George VI Negroes in a time when such types constitute a fast-vanishing species.
But notwithstanding this fact of life in the real world, there they were in their serried series as I saw them eating, drinking and picking their teeth; and for sure, in the dreamscape, I saw people who are – in the new guise of their polished children – today’s movers and shakers.
While I will not name them here and now, you will recognize them by virtue of the fact that they do move and they do shake.
I suspect that, when I saw Pindling just the other night, he wanted me to deliver a message to as many of his fellow-Bahamians to the effect that they should have as little fear of the present or the immediate future because for better or worse; Is still me, [Pindling] who is large and in charge.
But to make this aspect of the story as short and as painless as possible, take note that Ed Moxey was in the dream; and so was another of my friends, Chris Symonnet; who inquired as to how his family was doing on this side.
From this I surmised that the late Pindling was caught making a surprise visit –via whatever zombie express- to share something with the professor – a something that, he just knew the professor would share with you.
And so it goes again; just the other night, I dreamed a dream and in that dream, I caught up with Pindling.
And as I caught up with a then old Pindling, the talked turned to things both personal and political; and the thing that I remember most vividly – thus this typing in the early morning of the day that came after the night when I dreamed the dream whereof I now pluck some nuggets from what seems the depths of my mind.
And now, my fellow Bahamians, we march forward to the dreamscape itself –as I can even now espy that happy terrain; and as you can imagine, the matter involving Pindling and the man he was and the shadow he left are in and of themselves stories sufficient for any number of life-times as lived by any of mine who come after and who would like to know about the days that followed in this man’s mighty wake.
As I saw in and concluded and as Pindling himself concluded in the dream I had, no matter the fact that he was dead and gone, everything in the place and space where he once ran things, continues to be run as if Pindling had never left; that he – in truth and in metaphysical fact of the matter, could not and did not leave office even though he told the Parliament that he was finished with it.
But for sure, it must have dawned on him that while he might have thought he was finished with the House and the Senate and with the pomp and with the pageantry that would come with being Caesar Pindling.
And so it has been - So said; So done ; that, in all the years between the time Pindling died and the time he came back to see me as I slept and dreamed the dream I dreamed; this country has been run by Pindling himself; but this time around in the form of two of his most loyal men – Hubert Alexander Ingraham and Perry Gladstone Christie.
Hovering somewhere in my waking consciousness is the fact – now metaphysical – that Pindling did in truth and in fact have a political brother in the guise of Cecil Vincent Wallace-Whitfield who – yet again- in the world where I would have liked to live, was the best prime minister this blighted land of mine has never had.
That is what was fated to be when Cecil died at the age of sixty in that dread year that was 1990.
As the archival record and records throughout the land and throughout the world attest and do so solemnly affirm, Pindling – the mortal man- died on August 26th. 2000.
Dust to dust; ashes to ashes.
But evidently, things do not work as neatly and as simply in the world where Caesars are made and fashioned from the materials that come with politics; namely media, money and machinations and what these can and do achieve for the people who own them and to the people whose souls and minds are so routinely bought and sold for a pittance.
And so, while this or that Bahamian might aspire to change; the fact of the matter remains: no matter how the next general elections turn out: is still Ping who is large and in charge.
December 2nd, 2010
The Bahama Journal
A political blog about Bahamian politics in The Bahamas, Bahamian Politicans - and the entire Bahamas political lot. Bahamian Blogger Dennis Dames keeps you updated on the political news and views throughout the islands of The Bahamas without fear or favor. Bahamian Politicians and the Bahamian Political Arena: Updates one Post at a time on Bahamas Politics and Bahamas Politicans; and their local, regional and international policies and perspectives.
Showing posts with label Perry Gladstone Christie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Perry Gladstone Christie. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Baha Mar Drama - (Part 1)
The Drama at Baha Mar – Part 1
by Simon
Lights, camera, action! At least, that was the theory. With giddy fanfare the Christie administration broke into the ZNS evening news to broadcast live from Cable Beach a deal hyping an agreement with Baha Mar. The made-for-television reality show was obviously and deliberately timed to coincide with the beginning of the evening news, commandeering most of that night’s broadcast.
But after the lights and cameras trekked back to Third Terrace Centreville, nothing happened. Well, quite a bit happened. Except, of course, the construction of the promised mega complex. The original deal, the world economy and the Christie administration all collapsed, though not necessarily in that order.
The impressive architectural models and glittering high-tech videos of the touted development glossed over the realities on the ground. The public relations bonanza also obscured the nature and details surrounding the proposed plans to re-develop the historic Cable Beach.
We have seen this reality show before. It involves the same mindset, plot and cast of PLP cabinet ministers and their associated dealmakers that brought us the Great Mayaguana Land Give-away. The initial arrangements for the Baha Mar deal and the I-Group deal in Mayaguana involved more than rank hypocrisy by the party whose progressive and liberal brand name are whispery echoes of a by-gone era.
More fundamentally, the deals betrayed the PLP’s own nationalist rhetoric and chest-thumping patriotism. At the core of the Cable Beach and Mayaguana deals were stunning betrayals of the very idea of Bahamianization. This included making Bahamians subordinate in the deals, while alienating prime Crown Land and Government real estate to foreigners in perpetuity.
GALLING
Equally galling, was the PLP’s attempt to market these schemes to Bahamians as if we were idiots who could not see the big picture or read the fine print. There was also the smugness and arrogance by PLP hucksters. They pretended that these deals were more for the benefit of ordinary Bahamians than for the self-satisfied oligarchs who brokered them with gleeful abandon.
As recently as the 2010/11 budget debate, the Opposition’s Leader in the Senate, Senator Allyson Maynard Gibson, boasted that the Mayaguana Development Company, the group responsible for a proposed development at our most easterly island, was owned 50/50 by the I-Group and the Bahamas Government.
As noted in Front Porch in July: “This 50/50 arrangement would have eventually sold off nearly 100 per cent of Mayaguana’s coastal area and nearly 10,000 acres to non-Bahamians.
“As Mayaguana, by comparison, is somewhat larger than New Providence, the deal the PLP continues to brag about was the equivalent of turning over to a single developer a stretch of coastal land from the eastern end of New Providence to Lyford Cay. Again, the vast majority of this land would have ended up in foreign hands.”
Back to the drama at Baha Mar. Perry Gladstone Christie and his new PLP sold off at bargain basement prices prime beachfront and other public land at Cable Beach that Sir Stafford Sands and the UBP, Sir Lynden Pindling and an earlier version of the PLP, and Hubert Ingraham and the FNM never did over the course of more than half a century. Mr. Christie now has his place in the history books!
The original Baha Mar deal was a disaster on so many levels. Despite the rhetoric, the supposedly new PLP under Mr. Christie never updated their philosophy and policy ideas. The party simply wanted to be back in power. Upon returning to office they scrambled, cobbling together various slogans, clichés and talking points to justify their old habits of wheeling and dealing.
Perhaps realizing the controversial nature of significant elements of the original Baha Mar deal, Mr. Christie -- who purports to be the man of great consultation -- kept details of the deal secret. It was left to the Ingraham administration to table the Heads of Agreements on the initial deal.
INSULT
This was an insult added to the many injuries inflicted on our national interest in the initial deal, including public land sold at discounted prices and the proposed grant of extraordinarily generous concessions and cash payments. There were initial hints that Goodman’s Bay may have been alienated from the Bahamian people, though somebody appeared to backtrack quickly on this affront.
With Baha Mar and various anchor projects, the PLP failed to embrace newer ideas in terms of our tourism product and economic development. The idea of Baha Mar as essentially another Atlantis may have been a critical mistake. Such a vision stoked the egos of the proponents of the deal and Mr. Christie.
Still, a different type of project or variety of projects at Cable Beach, aimed at a different tourism demographic, would have been the wiser course of action. Moreover, rather than alienating invaluable public land, other arrangements could have been made to secure most of this land for generations of Bahamians.
In the Mayaguana deal the PLP at least pretended to be concerned about the national interest. The deal with Baha Mar was a give-away of monumental proportions.
There could have also been arrangements to enable Bahamians to have various levels of ownership and equity in a development which was to be built on mostly public land. Instead, the Christie administration turned its back on the core ideal of Bahamianization which was at the heart of the movement for Majority Rule.
Sadly, with the conclusion of the original deal with Baha Mar, there was no turning back, one of the slogans beloved by the PLP’s marketers. That other favourite PLP slogan, “Forward Ever, Backward Never”, also crashed and burned in light of the initial deal negotiated by Mr. Christie.
Having set in motion and made unavoidable many of the features of the current deal with Baha Mar, Mr. Christie in his typical political style, has left it up to Prime Minister Ingraham to do the heavy lifting on a final deal which he himself failed to conclude.
TONE!
Now Mr. Christie is commenting on the Prime Minister’s tone – tone! -- on a final deal. This is in keeping with his usual course of inaction in which style and tone are more important than substance. After all, who can forget his gushing and ingratiating tone when the Baha Mar deal was announced live on television? For all of Mr. Christie’s sweet melodies and tone, nothing happened.
Moreover, despite his lovely tone about the initial deal, he brokered an agreement which was wrong for The Bahamas on many levels. Mr. Ingraham has replaced Mr. Christie’s amateur tone with that of a seasoned leader. Whereas Mr. Christie was impetuous and cavalier, Mr. Ingraham has been measured and has driven a harder bargain.
Unlike Sir Lynden and the PLP’s unilateral abrogation of elements of the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, Mr. Ingraham negotiated the best deal he could for the Bahamas with Baha Mar. He has struck the right tone in negotiating with others who simply rolled over the hapless Mr. Christie, who was panicked about getting a deal at just about any cost to secure his re-election and legacy.
Short-term, the Prime Minister has sometimes been criticized about his manner and timing in negotiating elements of a final deal. In the longer term the wisdom of his negotiating strategy may prove more beneficial for the country.
In addition to tabling all heads of agreements related to Baha Mar, the Prime Minister is correct in bringing a resolution to the House of Assembly so that the Bahamian people’s elected representatives can express their will.
This will be time for Mr. Christie to do something which he has been reluctant to do from the inception of Baha Mar: To go on record clearly and unambiguously about his party’s stance on many of the controversial issues involved in an agreement whose initial seeds he helped to plant and water.
Baha Mar Drama - (Part 2)
bahamapundit
by Simon
Lights, camera, action! At least, that was the theory. With giddy fanfare the Christie administration broke into the ZNS evening news to broadcast live from Cable Beach a deal hyping an agreement with Baha Mar. The made-for-television reality show was obviously and deliberately timed to coincide with the beginning of the evening news, commandeering most of that night’s broadcast.
But after the lights and cameras trekked back to Third Terrace Centreville, nothing happened. Well, quite a bit happened. Except, of course, the construction of the promised mega complex. The original deal, the world economy and the Christie administration all collapsed, though not necessarily in that order.
The impressive architectural models and glittering high-tech videos of the touted development glossed over the realities on the ground. The public relations bonanza also obscured the nature and details surrounding the proposed plans to re-develop the historic Cable Beach.
We have seen this reality show before. It involves the same mindset, plot and cast of PLP cabinet ministers and their associated dealmakers that brought us the Great Mayaguana Land Give-away. The initial arrangements for the Baha Mar deal and the I-Group deal in Mayaguana involved more than rank hypocrisy by the party whose progressive and liberal brand name are whispery echoes of a by-gone era.
More fundamentally, the deals betrayed the PLP’s own nationalist rhetoric and chest-thumping patriotism. At the core of the Cable Beach and Mayaguana deals were stunning betrayals of the very idea of Bahamianization. This included making Bahamians subordinate in the deals, while alienating prime Crown Land and Government real estate to foreigners in perpetuity.
GALLING
Equally galling, was the PLP’s attempt to market these schemes to Bahamians as if we were idiots who could not see the big picture or read the fine print. There was also the smugness and arrogance by PLP hucksters. They pretended that these deals were more for the benefit of ordinary Bahamians than for the self-satisfied oligarchs who brokered them with gleeful abandon.
As recently as the 2010/11 budget debate, the Opposition’s Leader in the Senate, Senator Allyson Maynard Gibson, boasted that the Mayaguana Development Company, the group responsible for a proposed development at our most easterly island, was owned 50/50 by the I-Group and the Bahamas Government.
As noted in Front Porch in July: “This 50/50 arrangement would have eventually sold off nearly 100 per cent of Mayaguana’s coastal area and nearly 10,000 acres to non-Bahamians.
“As Mayaguana, by comparison, is somewhat larger than New Providence, the deal the PLP continues to brag about was the equivalent of turning over to a single developer a stretch of coastal land from the eastern end of New Providence to Lyford Cay. Again, the vast majority of this land would have ended up in foreign hands.”
Back to the drama at Baha Mar. Perry Gladstone Christie and his new PLP sold off at bargain basement prices prime beachfront and other public land at Cable Beach that Sir Stafford Sands and the UBP, Sir Lynden Pindling and an earlier version of the PLP, and Hubert Ingraham and the FNM never did over the course of more than half a century. Mr. Christie now has his place in the history books!
The original Baha Mar deal was a disaster on so many levels. Despite the rhetoric, the supposedly new PLP under Mr. Christie never updated their philosophy and policy ideas. The party simply wanted to be back in power. Upon returning to office they scrambled, cobbling together various slogans, clichés and talking points to justify their old habits of wheeling and dealing.
Perhaps realizing the controversial nature of significant elements of the original Baha Mar deal, Mr. Christie -- who purports to be the man of great consultation -- kept details of the deal secret. It was left to the Ingraham administration to table the Heads of Agreements on the initial deal.
INSULT
This was an insult added to the many injuries inflicted on our national interest in the initial deal, including public land sold at discounted prices and the proposed grant of extraordinarily generous concessions and cash payments. There were initial hints that Goodman’s Bay may have been alienated from the Bahamian people, though somebody appeared to backtrack quickly on this affront.
With Baha Mar and various anchor projects, the PLP failed to embrace newer ideas in terms of our tourism product and economic development. The idea of Baha Mar as essentially another Atlantis may have been a critical mistake. Such a vision stoked the egos of the proponents of the deal and Mr. Christie.
Still, a different type of project or variety of projects at Cable Beach, aimed at a different tourism demographic, would have been the wiser course of action. Moreover, rather than alienating invaluable public land, other arrangements could have been made to secure most of this land for generations of Bahamians.
In the Mayaguana deal the PLP at least pretended to be concerned about the national interest. The deal with Baha Mar was a give-away of monumental proportions.
There could have also been arrangements to enable Bahamians to have various levels of ownership and equity in a development which was to be built on mostly public land. Instead, the Christie administration turned its back on the core ideal of Bahamianization which was at the heart of the movement for Majority Rule.
Sadly, with the conclusion of the original deal with Baha Mar, there was no turning back, one of the slogans beloved by the PLP’s marketers. That other favourite PLP slogan, “Forward Ever, Backward Never”, also crashed and burned in light of the initial deal negotiated by Mr. Christie.
Having set in motion and made unavoidable many of the features of the current deal with Baha Mar, Mr. Christie in his typical political style, has left it up to Prime Minister Ingraham to do the heavy lifting on a final deal which he himself failed to conclude.
TONE!
Now Mr. Christie is commenting on the Prime Minister’s tone – tone! -- on a final deal. This is in keeping with his usual course of inaction in which style and tone are more important than substance. After all, who can forget his gushing and ingratiating tone when the Baha Mar deal was announced live on television? For all of Mr. Christie’s sweet melodies and tone, nothing happened.
Moreover, despite his lovely tone about the initial deal, he brokered an agreement which was wrong for The Bahamas on many levels. Mr. Ingraham has replaced Mr. Christie’s amateur tone with that of a seasoned leader. Whereas Mr. Christie was impetuous and cavalier, Mr. Ingraham has been measured and has driven a harder bargain.
Unlike Sir Lynden and the PLP’s unilateral abrogation of elements of the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, Mr. Ingraham negotiated the best deal he could for the Bahamas with Baha Mar. He has struck the right tone in negotiating with others who simply rolled over the hapless Mr. Christie, who was panicked about getting a deal at just about any cost to secure his re-election and legacy.
Short-term, the Prime Minister has sometimes been criticized about his manner and timing in negotiating elements of a final deal. In the longer term the wisdom of his negotiating strategy may prove more beneficial for the country.
In addition to tabling all heads of agreements related to Baha Mar, the Prime Minister is correct in bringing a resolution to the House of Assembly so that the Bahamian people’s elected representatives can express their will.
This will be time for Mr. Christie to do something which he has been reluctant to do from the inception of Baha Mar: To go on record clearly and unambiguously about his party’s stance on many of the controversial issues involved in an agreement whose initial seeds he helped to plant and water.
Baha Mar Drama - (Part 2)
bahamapundit
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)