We have a trend in Barbados where national issues start wrong but later appear right, or remain glaringly wrong for years before someone awakes from a dream or vision, or someone new comes along and tries to do the right thing.
Then, “sudden so”, what has been wrong for decades is blown like a horrid deed into every eye, to paraphrase Shakespeare, and the deed must be stopped post-haste.
Foolishness! Whoever was allowing deeds like sub-contracting graves for years in Westbury Cemetery was doing nonsense, and the one stopping it now must be commended, like the current Minister of Agriculture, who is taking the proverbial bull by the horns and flushing out longstanding, costly issues at the Barbados Water Authority (BWA).
The shakeup at the taxpayer-funded BWA has recently highlighted concerns about activities relating to tenders and procurement at the Pine Hill-based institution. But other concerns were previously addressed with threats of “radical changes” by the late former Prime Minister David Thompson, while ministers Dr Denis Lowe and Dr David Estwick sounded warnings in 2009 about exorbitant overtime costs, a poor work ethic and incorrect management structures.
After a subsequent injection of $13 million to help top up the BWA’s diminishing return on expenditure, it is not surprising that “breaches” have continued and have not gone down well with Estwick, who is the minister responsible for the BWA.
Noting that one weakness of the management of statutory corporations was that “they were usually too lazy to establish their own financial rules” – another longstanding wrong – he made it clear that he would bring about a change which, from all appearances, will lead to heads rolling.
Another longstanding wrong brought to light last week was the revelation that some?private day care set-ups have been operating without appropriate Town Planning Department permission.
The First Steps Academy Nursery & Preschool, which had been operating since 2008 and had grown to accommodate 94 children and a staff complement of 17, was served notice by the Town Planning Department and the Child Care Board (CCB) to cease operations at Neil’s Plantation.
Clearly, someone in authority would have been aware of similar infractions even before 2008 but, suddenly, because someone in the Neil’s compound complained, light has entered the darkness previously covering the day care.
At the same time, madness continues at the island’s largest cemetery where, for years, gravediggers employed by the Sanitation Service Authority have been sub-contracting the digging to other people, arguing that “everybody must eat” – even if illegally.
Were I to decide to enter the Nation Publishing Company, relax, and get two youngsters with writing ability to cover any activity or interview to which I am assigned, I’m almost certain that my colleagues would recommend a psychiatric evaluation and that the presence of my name in this newspaper would be a mere memory.
Yet the strident calls to remove the Superintendent of Cemeteries, who wants to stop sub-contracting, are taken seriously. And within weeks of Minister Lowe’s announcement that all was well at Westbury, another man not employed by the SSA was found digging graves.
Also last week, the issue of “pirate” vans operating on routes given by Government to ZR operators was again in the news. Again, the excuse has been that “every man must eat”.
So as many as 30 illegal vans have been cutting out the two ZRs assigned to Sugar Hill, driving even more dangerously than the ZR drivers, and picking up people anywhere, even in the heart of town.
The police are now teaming up with the General Insurance Association of Barbados and the Licensing Authority to stop it, but we’ve heard this before.
I live in hope.
An unassuming farmer in Northern Ireland took a principled stand not to have a half-naked Rihanna parade on his land, and was almost pilloried by the society in which he lives!
After politely asking Rihanna and her crew to leave, the action of Alan Graham, a 61-year-old Christian, is being treated with disbelief and, in some cases, acute disdain.
I admire Rihanna but I would have shaken Mr Graham’s hand as he made his personal decision, parted amicably with the Barbadian star and turned down a hefty sum for use of his land in a music video.
I’m saddened, however, that he has been accused by some Irish folk of somehow hurting Northern Ireland’s tourism industry and halting the country’s progress.
The point here isn’t whether Rihanna was wrong or right – she’s doing her job. The point is that a man who represents the standards which most societies have long sacrificed at the altar of show business, showed a 23-year-old who could be his granddaughter that there is more to this fleeting life than fame and wealth.
