Barbados authorities continue to brace for the fallout from the vicious attack on two Canadian visitors which has resulted in one death. Up until now Barbados had managed to remain relatively unscathed from major negative incidents which involved tourists.

For many years the cracks had started to appear but Barbadians appear to believe that Barbados is a blessed country and God would protect us. What has now become obviously apparent is that the pristine image sold of Barbados as an island paradise has been besmirched. While it is true that as a country we should be concerned with protecting all citizens, the ramifications of the Terry Schwarzfeld incident will reverberate around the world whether we like it or not.  Long gone are the days when our local media would hide news and hope to ride out negative incidents. This is the Information Age and news today can reach any corner of the globe in an instant.

What the local authorities and media need to prioritize is a strategy to fight against the negative forces which are trying to take over our country. When all is said and done we are only 166 square miles for Godsake! If adequate resources were targeted at solutions to security concerns in Barbados and specifically targeted at the tourist belt five years ago, we would have been ahead of the game. Now Barbados has the distinction of being categorized with Antigua, Tobago, St. Lucia, Aruba and other Caribbean destinations where vicious attacks on tourists have resulted in the most tragic of occurrences.

Barbadians to a child know that tourism is our business and contributes significantly to the Gross Domestic Product. The fact that we can all agree that the incident at Long Beach is a isolated act, all the indicators point to a deterioration in hard crime on the island. We have been observing the deterioration in civil society whether we view it on our roads by private and PSV drivers alike, in our schools with the many instances of student resistance to authority, from our officials who perform for money only and not for love of vocation, the attitude that to deliver service is not cool …

Lastly, our officials believe that we can open our borders and let all characters enter. While we beat our chests that we are meeting our regional and international obligations to facilitate freedom of movement, we do so with a deficient immigration framework which has shown itself to be woefully inadequate. Commonsense tells us that we will have some more challenges down the road regarding some of the unsavoury characters entering Barbados under CariPASS.

Even so, Barbados in relative terms continues to perform well, however we must caution our officials that old approaches to managing the tourism sector will not work. Although we applaud the current Minister of Tourism Richard Sealy for taking the bold step to restructure the Barbados Tourism Authority Board, what purpose will it serve if we have a tarnished brand to sell?

In light of the significant contribution of tourism to the national coffers we wonder why this would not be demonstrated in a serious reward being offered for the capture of the vagabond(s) who murdered the Canadian tourist? We find the current reward of $20, 000 dollars to be insulting when matched against the weight of the crime and the significance of the tourist industry to Barbados. Would it not demonstrate to Barbadians and the others observing from outside that the Barbados government and the other stakeholders view this as an opportunity to demonstrate the seriousness of this matter?

Let us hypothesize if a $100, 000 reward was offered for evidence leading to the arrest of the perpetrator of the crime at Long Beach. It is only then that we would feel that we are serious.