IT IS WITH MUCH DISMAY that I watch from the sidelines as our beautiful country continues to slide deeper and deeper down the tubes.
We are being led by a leader whose approach can only be regarded as persistent “fumbling stewardship”. We continue to disregard the plight of the poor and the disadvantaged, as we respond reactively to some of the needs of the people.
The country’s primary health care facility limps along on promises of increased budgets, which never seem to bear fruit.
Similarly, our main educational institutions remain largely unfunded and the imposition of fees on the poorest of families of students attending has met with no further support from ministers, in spite of promises of available funds to deal with the crises. It gets worse day by day.
The leadership remains blinkered. The United Kingdom has 650 members of Parliament to serve a population of 65.14 million people. Their government consists of 15 Cabinet ministers. The Barbados Government has 15 Cabinet ministers, for a population of just 284 215, as at 2015.
Why on earth do we need such a large Cabinet, which drains the country of much-needed resources, to serve a small population. Consider the additional funds for ministries, the salaries, the perks foisted upon the people of Barbados to keep these ministers for one or two terms, so that they can become pensionable and [leave] at the end, leaving the country in a much poorer state.
Year after year the Prime Minister hosts receptions for repeat visitors. Such expense visited upon our exchequer is unnecessary at a time when much needed funds should be diverted to social, educational, road and infrastructure and welfare programmes.
The Public Accounts Committee and the Auditor General are treated with scant regard. We have statutory corporations which fail to file annual returns and remain unaccountable for the annual squandering of the scarce funds vested in them by the Minister of Finance.
Year after year we have the same complaints by the Auditor General. Funds remain unaccounted for; expenditure is vague and unexplained, and “lost” in the system. The audit trail is blurred repeatedly and no one is brought to book.
Where are the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance whilst all of these shortcomings continue to infect the economy of Barbados and drain the public purse of its limited resources? No one takes responsibility. We are not a banana republic; we are a so-called stable economy and democracy. I have my doubts.
Several of the statutory corporations should be revisited without much more hesitation. Forget about familial ties, political patronage appointments and kinships within them and let us look at the performance of the majority of these entities. At least two of them perform identical tasks and have similar modus operandi.
One of these could easily be shut down or become an amalgam of the other, thus saving the annual subvention of almost $15 million. At least one, which I have been closely involved, is nothing more than a tourism and travel bureau for its staff, especially the senior officers employed by it. It is regarded by all within as nothing more than a gravy train.
Sadly, it is unlikely that any new incoming government will make a difference. The history of politics on this island serves to remind us that it will be much more of the same.
Unless we overhaul our culture, our ability to put the people and their needs first, to focus on the development of the country, improvement of education, health, social services and infrastructure, we will end up yet again with one or more terms of ineptitude [and] poor leadership . . . .
Enough is enough. It is high time to crawl from under the era of “Fumbling Stewardship”!
– RICHARD R. BLENMAN