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George C. Brathwaite
George C. Brathwaite

At the 2007 Annual Delegate’s Conference of the Democratic Labour Party (DLP), the then Leader of the Opposition, David Thompson, began his featured speech by invoking a few disclaimers. It was revealed that there were groups within civil society actively speaking out against several perceived ills. Freedom of expression prevailed in Barbados under the political sacrosanct of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP) that was being led by the economically acclaimed and intellectually gifted Owen Arthur, in spite of mounting and troublesome criticisms against the government.

David Thompson, in his address, said then that the situation in Barbados had reached a stage wherein there were pronounced “signs of frustration and despair.” Thompson goaded the public into thinking that it was inconceivable why the BLP had become “so indifferent and disconnected from the people it was elected to serve.” Thompson’s utterances were glazed in flowery language and buttered with a mischief to exploit weaknesses which appeared in the seemingly invincible Arthur-led team. The DLP, through its leader, promised to “imbue new hope and optimism” into Barbadians because Barbados was on a “slippery slope of division,” and it had become infested by “stagnation and malfeasance in public administration.” One wonders how necessary was this charade at the end of 2007 when now compared with those things have been evidenced this year at the end of 2013?

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328 responses to “Lessons to Guide Another Dichotomous DLP Cabinet: Save Barbados Now!”


  1. Bag Juice, perhaps 13 is in some twisted way the psychological equivalent 666? Who knows? And who really cares? Because it does not change the current economic reality in the small island of Barbados in any meaningful way! What we ought to be focusing on is the positive as well as the inventive ways in which to address the current economic predicament that is obviously sucking the daily life out of the people of Barbados. Any fool can kick down a barn but it takes a skillful carpenter to build one.


  2. @aBajan New Yorker

    We do not have long to wait to find out.


  3. @ David

    “According to government spokesmen the free bus fare is part of a social policy to counter the counter culture emanating from the minibus sector”.

    This is madness. No other explanation. I hope you didn’t swallow this garbage.

    Maybe they should distribute some free weed to “counter the counter culture emanating on the block”. I know this is an exaggeration but these cats are really non thinkers with absolutely no understanding of basic pocket book money sense. And we let them run the entire economy? In the ground? I am disappointed with the populace, very disappointed.


  4. And by the same token: the DLP as does the BLP, ought to know that it makes no good sense for horse to kick you twice.


  5. END OF YEAR EXAM
    QUESTION 1 -(Compulsory)

    The BLP left Office in 2008 and left the Barbados economy in a state that if proper management of the economy had ensued , we would not be in this situation today.

    Owen Arthur warned of tough times ahead when he considered how the world economy was poised. Owen said : “Now is not the time for a change in Government” He asked the question : Change to what and change for what ?

    The people of Barbados took things for granted ad elected a bankrupt, corrupt bunch of wild boys to Office.

    The Question is ; If those who voted for the DLP in 2008 knew that this would be the end result, would they have voted for the DLP

    This question is worth 25 marks and is compulsory
    Make sure than in your answer, you make no reference to the people from St. John. We are dealing without normal people here. Please be guided.

  6. aBajan New Yorker Avatar
    aBajan New Yorker

    Thank you David.


  7. DEEDS
    How you get 13 from 1966 bozie…?


  8. @NUPW
    http://www.nationnews.com/articles/view/new-set-of-nupw-proposals/#148942

    Who told the NUPW that the workers wanted a one week salary cut. Next minute this tricky DLP use some loophole in language and law and say it is a one week cut every month.


  9. @ Just Asking
    I must say that the prognostication of the vicissitudinous nature of the global economy was a mark of genius on the part of Owen Arthur. (lol) And I am quite sure it took the temerity as well as audacious impudicity to advance a statement that is intricately interweaved with such mendacity.

  10. are-we-there-yet? Avatar
    are-we-there-yet?

    George Brathwaite; I agree in general terms with the thrust of your post. I think that the DLP leadership, its cabinet, its parliamentarians and its advisors have consistently shown over the past 6 years or so that they are incapable of managing the small economy and society of Barbados. In my view the main reason for that incapacity is the inept leader himself who has been unable to inspire any confidence in his ability to lead the country properly in the face of the instability of an external environment which is being effectively countered by several regional countries that have traditionally been no better managed than Barbados. Barbados’ economy has been worse managed than any others in the region over the past 5 or so years.

    However, in spite of the proven intellectual, managerial and other superiority of the BLP over the current DLP MP’s and advisors, I do not think that an exchange of this DLP government with the current BLP will sort out our problems in the near term. The almost unimaginable damage that this current Government has wreaked on this economy has ensured that it would be a herculean and indeed thankless task to turn things around if there were merely a switching of parties running the Government and that both should be involved in correcting our situation.

    I do not think that jettisoning the DLP and BLP for some unknown untested and untried party with Pachamanian or Bushman philosophies will be helpful to the Island.

    I think that some sort of coalition is probably the best way forward, with Stuart somehow excluded from a Ministerial position and Sinckler excluded from the MoF position and the GoCB persuaded to retire. What set of circumstances might propel such a situation may become clearer as the enormity of Barbados’ current woes sink in with the laying off of in excess of 3000 public workers and possible wage cuts as well, and the contraction in the economy and its attendant ills caused by these and the other IMF inspired solutions such as higher taxes, the dreaded devaluation, etc. But I think that the IMF inspired actions of this government will lead to such hardship amongst a large percentage of the population that it will trigger a backlash such that one will wonder if normally docile Barbadians have gone mad. Then is when either good sense will prevail and we will get some leaders to move Barbados onto a surer footing or to chaos of the type implicit in the Pachamanian writings.

  11. aBajan New Yorker Avatar
    aBajan New Yorker

    David, can you carryout a survey among the BU family to get an understanding of what they want for Barbados as a whole and not as individuals?

    A lot of the feedback I read above contain great suggestions and show up the 2 political parties for who they are. But the party supporters in my opinion continue to cloud the discussions with the party politics.

    So much more I can say but am going to stop herd for now, and just state that the cat and mouse game is over, accept the bitter pill and get on with restructuring the economy, civil service and the judiciary of Barbados. I know the feeling of loosing your job as I have been layoff twice in the past 20 years. After 911 for 1 year and again in 2008 after the financial melt down for 2 1/2 years.

  12. PLANTATION DEEDS FROM 1926 TO 2013 , MASSIVE FRAUD ,LAND TAX BILLS AND NO DEEDS OF BARBADOS, BLPand DLP=Massive Fruad Avatar
    PLANTATION DEEDS FROM 1926 TO 2013 , MASSIVE FRAUD ,LAND TAX BILLS AND NO DEEDS OF BARBADOS, BLPand DLP=Massive Fruad

    Bush Tea | 27/12/2013 at 8:53 pm | Reply @ you drop the 9s and 0 or zero is a place holder and not a number,There is a seen number and unseen number , This how their Math . to operate out side of what they allow us to see,

  13. aBajan New Yorker Avatar

    excuse the typing errors.


  14. @Are we there yet
    It would certainly provide the readership here with some measure of understanding, if you allow us some insight into the statistical analysis you have utilized to arrive at the hypothesis that the IMF inspired action it to no avail? Because all we have heard from you thus far is mere lip- service and the want of substantiate as well as corroborative is greatly lacking my friend.


  15. Thank you DEEDS…I think….
    Clear as mud.


  16. Please excuse my typing error as well; it reflects my progressive cognitive decline.


  17. @aBajan New Yorker

    One has to understand that one of these party in the short term will have to lead the country in restructuring the economy. Me personally, I would have to give that job to the BLP.

    Giving what you are seeing would you, could you trust the DLP to do it? it’s not politics when one says these guys don’t know their head from they ass. that is a fact. so what do you do? do the something every and expect a different result?

    We as a people need to get real and demand better.


  18. The NUPW is a discredited organisation right now. It lacks credibility. It has been in bed with this inept incompetent government. In May, Dennis Clarke let it slip out of his mouth in an interview with Stetson Babb, that it was inevitable that would be layoffs in the public sector.

    Why did they not put forward their proposals then? They are not serious, they are fooling their members…..playing to the gallery. The deal is a done one, the IMF so dictated and the unions know that it is not 3000 people going home, it is in the region of 5561.

    Dont you find it passing strange that there is not a proposal to get rid of the constituency councils? Go figure……….members of their leadership are on these constituency councils.

    A relative of mine told me that they will not be accepting any salary cut if the PM does not cut his cabinet or get rid of the constituency councils!


  19. Who gave you a thesaurus for Christmas Mark…?
    If you are seeking to impress with big words you have come to the wrong place…..
    Skippa, you cannot even tie the shoe laces of a fella we use to call DICTIONARY ….. LOL and he didn’t last as long as a snow cone on a summer beach….On BU, we ‘don’t mek dat kiinn’ah sport’ ….( as a 12 year-old grand bush boy said to Bushie Christmas Day…. LOl)

    Stop trying to show off man!
    You sound like a shiite!


  20. @Are we there yet
    Your piece of compositional eloquence is somewhat lacking in validity as well as intellectual honesty and it certainly amounts to what Winston Churchill once called: a terminological inexactitude.


  21. Bush Tea
    Let me say this much: I am not quite if you hit your head this evening, or you have forgotten to somehow take you early dose of antipsychotic medication? Whatever the case… it seems as though your psychosis is getting the best of you buddy.

  22. aBajan New Yorker Avatar

    David, I agree with you 100% as am not expecting the DLP to do any better as all they ideas have failed. am not expecting the BLP to be any better, I just want them to fix the system once given the chance to and not let the broken system continue to bleed. I hope Mam will be given the opportunity to, and that her colleagues will not play musical chairs with her.


  23. Like it or not effyamama,the DLP has proved time and again that the level of individual coming forward as political candidates are piss poor rakey down on heel wannabes.All you DLP rejects can scream to the top of your lungs.none ‘o wunna in got the vision to lead Barbados as it is accustomed to being led by the giants of a bygone era.You DLP can continue to call Errol Barrow name from now ’til the cows come home,wunna can’t get this economy manage and wunna doan instil confidence in anybody to invest in wunna stupid projects which are not well thought out.
    Imagine these dangerous,dimwitted,deluded liars and cheats,idiots and unbelievably stupid poor rakey excuses for a government of Barbados,voted in to power since January 2008 and all they can show for 6 years of occupying space at Government Headquarters is a walkover outside CBC at the Pine,a big sign outside the old BET headquarters and an ovalabout by Simpson Motors.What an embarrassment to the bajan people.We are not used to this incompetence and neglect and paying through our noses for neffin in return.Wunna bunch ‘o wile boys!Step aside and let an OSA led Labour Party with Clyde in tow and in training,take over from this triple clown of downgrades,and put Barbados back on track towards growth.Arthur and Mascoll to the rescue right away.Don’t delay..

  24. are-we-there-yet? Avatar

    David (not BU)

    I think what you have said above merits repetition with some emphasis; One has to understand that one of these parties in the short term will have to lead the country in restructuring the economy. Me personally, I would have to give that job to the BLP. Giving what you are seeing would you, could you trust the DLP to do it?
    IT’s NOT POLITICS when one says these guys donโ€™t know their head from they ass. that is a fact. so what do you do? do the same thing every (time) and expect a different result? We as a people need to get real and demand better.

    Mark Fenty;
    I think you misread my post above. I did not seek to imply that an IMF programme or indeed what appears to be an IMF inspired programme at this stage might not be ultimately beneficial to Barbados. What I was trying to say is that the immediate effects of IMF type austerity programmes are always mired in very deleterious circumstances for the poor and not-so-poor in every country where they have been instituted. Where countries have been accustomed to entering and exiting such programmes on a regular basis (as in Jamaica) the resultant upheavals might have waned in amplititude over time. For Barbados, which has not been in that league, there is a good chance of serious chaos here like nothing we have experienced over the past 86 years, if the glimmerings of such a program that shows through the Government that you so dearly defend attacking 3 of its sacred cows with venom over the past 2 months are anything to go by.

    Read my post again. Just google IMF and social effects of IMF programmes for any refutation or substantiation or corroboration of my points that you might require.

    What lip service what?


  25. I think the public sector need to give up more. For the last few years the private sector have taken the brunt by sending people home, closed businesses, salary cuts, short weeks, no increases. All the public sector is offering is the loss of 1 weeks pay. I had initially thought it was 1 weeks pay per month for the 1st 3 months of 2014 not 1 weeks pay in total!

    I would feel more comfortable about it if the service was good in all departments but imagine going for your driving licence and being told to come back in an hour because the person that deals with the photos (renewal not new licence) is at lunch…..can’t work! I don’t want people to be sent home but those that do not do any work need to go but unfortunately I suspect the good workers will be sent home and the shirkers will get to stay.

    I agree to the reinstatement of bus fares for children but in doing so there has to be some kind of means assessment that identifies the real families that cannot afford to pay bus fare and the child issued with a free bus pass with a photo..

    In terms of the other suggestions by the NUPW I cannot see how it will generate money. Reduce VAT to 15% yes more money in your pocket but hold on now your paying more for petrol, cell phone tax at 5% that previously no one could work out how to implement (negative affect on businesses) i.e. still no more or could be less money to spend so the economy remains static or declines further.

    I’m not sure what the solution is but taxing your way out of a recession is not the way to go. We’ve been trying for the last 5-6 years and it hasn’t worked, so why continue on that path?


  26. Bush Tea, I am beginning to see into the mind of a man who obtains pleasure from marginalizing the opinions of others, as he seeks to aggrandized his every present sense of inadequacy. Now, do I have to insult your intelligence any further Bushy? Well, with that being said: I hope that I can pursue you to return to the topic of deliberation, which you have as yet not been able to engage without vitiating the characters of others.


  27. Ok let me take back my comment on taxes. How about adding a corkage fee or something on alcohol, local purchases only because we don’t want to negatively affect our duty free sales. Say like when you buy 4 Banks for $10.00 you are charged an additional 10 cents per bottle or you buy a rum and coke at a bar; and pay an additional 10 cents That money goes into the Government kitty. The problem would be how to collect it, I haven’t worked that one out yet.. So many people love to drink, including tourist and myself I would not be adverse to contributing an additional 10 cents.

    Pretty much like how OSA added a 1 cent on petrol and collected loads of money and most people didn’t even notice.


  28. And finally, from an intellectual standpoint Bush Tea: a “Rat” as big as a “Cow”, would still be a Slave to a “Cat”. Now, employ the full measure of your intellectual perspicacity, as you make a reiterated endeavor to interpretively extrapolate the dictum that is before you my friend. If you so kindly permit me the pleasure to address you in such manner Bush Tea.


  29. Bush Tea, I thought I had imparted in to your hearing the fact that you ought to attack that argument and not the bearer of the argument in itself?

    But it seems as though the sheer scope of your comprehension prevents you from comprehending the word I had spoken to you?

    Now in any even, I only hope that our little confabulation will support and increased understanding and aid in the growth of your maturation. lol


  30. mark fenty says to bush tea

    Now in any even, I only hope that our little confabulation will support and increased understanding and aid in the growth of your maturation. lol
    ……………………………………………………………………………………………………….
    ac to bush tea

    Now in any even, I only hope that this little confabulation will support and increased understanding and aid in the growth of your mental masturbation.. lol


  31. as 2013 comes to a close i reflect on now what seems to be a covert effort unleashed on a country by the opposition political party one that was determined to set cut a path of mindful and meaningless self destruction of crippling an economy preaching and abating in the self prophesy of what their prediction of gloom and doom of this tiny island,,,,, to the opposition BLP party and its followers i say this ingenious and self serving impracticality has done all the harmed intended. needless to say because of your timeless and glorious efforts all must suffer


  32. Are-we-there said we need to demand better. Is that the common ground? If so, how do we make the demand and is there any viable alternative to the BLP through which to make it?


  33. There is no visible alternative at the moment hopefully the tension will be a catalyst for options to emerge.


  34. Wuh ac…..yours mek more sense…. ๐Ÿ™‚


  35. @ David [BU]

    Long have i slaved in the eternal hope of a similar “self combustion” where “a greater Athens will arise,and to remoter time …with light of science in their eyes”

    I partially quote you “hopefully the tension” (another word for incompetence) “will be the catalyst for options to emerge”

    Where David [BU]?

    To get in the HoA you have to run the gauntlet of character assassination and contrived lies and deceipt.

    Then you have to have as much money as Owen and Mia and and as many IPADS to give away like Sinckler or the inability to see people paying for votes (and a commensurate inability to speak) like Fumble

    We are doomed with this DLP/BLP mix, and even though we are all fully cognisant of the idiocy and inveterate incompetencies in either camp, there is really no way and/or desire to change the madness.

    Look at the known alternatives – David Commissiong and the PDC!!

    Commissiong cant even run the NGO tingy on Crumpton Street furthermore the affairs of 300K, Bajans and illegals.

    We goose cooked


  36. @Piece

    One must live in hope. Can you imagine the thinking of a Black slave in 1800?

  37. millertheanunnaki Avatar

    @ Prodigal Son | 27/12/2013 at 10:42 pm
    โ€œThey are not serious, they are fooling their membersโ€ฆ..playing to the gallery. The deal is a done one, the IMF so dictated and the unions know that it is not 3000 people going home, it is in the region of 5561.โ€

    You have aptly responded to the query raised by โ€œBag Juice.

    The unions, especially the NUPW headed by the gadflies Maloney & Clarke, are just taking the workers for a ride down a cul-de-sac of no return. Clarke is about to be superannuated and doesnโ€™t give two hoots about the thousand of workers about to be dismissed. His crocodile tears of โ€˜concernโ€™ for the economy and wider society are just wasted foul air emanating from his double-dealing mouth.

    Clarke & Co know full well that the Government has entered a nonnegotiable pact with the IMF that cannot be rescinded because of the immediate consequences of triggering a DEVALUATION of the currency.
    The unions can put alternative proposals on the table but the removal of thousands from the payroll before the end of the financial year is a sine qua non for future IMF support.
    The preparation of the 2014/2015 Estimates under the direct supervision of the IMF will be done on the irrevocable budgetary assumption that the personal emoluments budget will reflect a significant reduction in manpower costs and numbers.

    Why do you think that the Cabinetโ€™s hands were forced into announcing the pending layoffs before Xmas and before the IMF officials arrived back in Washington?
    If the matter was up for negotiation with the unions specific numbers of workers to be retrenched and the timelines would not have been made public before Xmas given the potential serious social and political fallout.
    Neither the Government nor the unions have any further say in the matter. The die is cast!

    The IMF officials will be taking up residence rather shortly to โ€œmanageโ€ the fiscal affairs of Barbados.
    They, the DLP administration, were warned but refused to take heed rather preferring to ignore the โ€˜Inconvenient Truthโ€™ and attack those who were able to see the inevitable consequences and labeling them prophets of gloom and doom.

    Well, the doom and gloom have arrived. But will the same inept people be able to see the light and accept positive alternative proposals to ease the burden of the heavy fiscal and social load upon the poor (but not innocent) people of Barbados?


  38. Plantation…Iceland jailed the bankers, Iran hung them (my kinda guys)..

    I guess $47 million sounds like a lot to Walter Maloney, or is he mixing up 47 million with $470 million dollars, otherwise he really does need a crash course in how an economy is managed…again i ask, if they (the politicians) had a large economy with millions and millions of taxpayers to manage, what the hell would they do?? for sure the Mercedes and Bimmers they love to drive could not get any damn bigger.


  39. David | 28/12/2013 at 8:11 am | Reply
    @Piece

    One must live in hope. Can you imagine the thinking of a Black slave in 1800?

    Unfortunately, the mentality of descendants of African slaves worldwide, have not changed that much since the 1800s, it’s still a work in progress. I don’t want to single out any particular country it would be unfair, but it varies from country to country that some are worse than others.


  40. What live in what hope what?!.
    Wunna fellows ARE hopeless. Where there is no vision, all ah we donkeys will perish…..

    IMAGINE that Bushie explained in great detail here on BU -THE ULTIMATE solution to wunna troubles -and wunna push wunna noses in the air and stuck wid wunna BLP/DLP shiite…. Wunna ain’t want to hear nuttin bout BBE….

    ….so Bushie come next and IN GREAT DETAIL again, outline the SECOND best plan…BUP…. Which would extricate wunna from this quagmire of BLP/DLP feces…. Wunna ain’t want to hear bout that NEITHER…… Wunna still banking on wunna BLP/DLP. Shiite…

    Go to donkey long…..
    …follow Freundel and Mia …..and Arthur (when he sober)….

    Shiite man.
    A fella can’t help wunna even if wunna realize that wunna blind, deaf and can’t smell…


  41. You either manufacture or have a high unemployment rate, because the profit driven private sector will never create enough jobs. The difference between then and now is that Arthur did not have to borrow to pay salaries.


  42. Manufacturer though unsustainable? We have to create more sustainable strategies. Remember Arthur’s approach of selling land to complement tourism and FDI revenues was also unsustainable to drive the economy. Hell he even admitted it.


  43. But Enuff, if you hire large numbers when times are good, AND PASS A LAW THAT THEIR PAY CANNOT BE EVER CUT how is that good planning?
    Ever heard of making HAY while the sun shines…?
    Wunna set up the damn people…!


  44. Bush Tea
    How many were hired post-2008? How many hired pre-2008 were permanent or met the 2007 Act requirements? What contributed to the reduction in government revenue and increased expenditures? DLPbad policy?


  45. @enuff

    Which supports the point being made all along, successive government have brought us to this place.


  46. After cotton, sugar, manufacturing etc etc do you believe in ‘sustainability’? With what appears to be a constantly evolving GLOBAL economy, it appears to me that capitalising on current opportunities and trying to identify the next is the best strategy.


  47. @enuff

    All to satisfy conspicuous consumption?


  48. It is time the folks over at George Street remove the programmed hard drive from your brain.


  49. @enuff

    We can certainly agree to disagree. A reminder that economic structural flaws existed when your party was at the controls and they did noting significant about it. This is a reality.


  50. Ho Ho HO.
    It was Christmas time.
    Now is REALITY time.
    Our lil ole rock , brekkin up.
    Sinclar the Tinkerer,does tink cos he can mek de clock hands move de clock workin.
    He Boss man figure he smart cos he say” at least de clock right two times a day”
    Oh Ho Ho Ho.
    De arrogance de man got,circumvent de financial juiggerry pokey de red man do wid de finance shit and we does get inta de market direct.
    Like do away wid de guy in de middle.Get we hands on all dat cash direct.
    Lets float a TITANIC bond and get all de greenback .
    SMART BO!!
    Brain surgery from a book come next.
    Sure sign de giant awoke , and de Stinkliar been Tinkerin again.
    ENT NUHBODY tole you’se guys a Lil knowledge is a a dangerous ting.
    En NO knowledge is a DISASTER.

    OH ho ho ho.
    I reading a lil ole book call “Animal farm” its what dem Red men call an Allegorical Tale.
    I does also watch”Planet of the apes”.
    HMMMm??
    I does figure dat is also an Allegorical story bout when we folk does get our
    hands in de till, Worldwide.
    “WE” being like Stinkliar de Tinkerer ,clockmender extrordinair en he buddy de sleepin Giant.

    OH Ho ho ho.
    I ent laffin nah more.
    Woe is me ,I am without.

    I hear dey close up BAHDAHDUS zoo over St Phillip, it ent close ,jus move to Town.

    Parliament AKA Planitarium of the Apes.

    Is this what we call Govenance?
    Chimpanzees Tinkerin wid de clock!!!???
    BAHBADUS run by a Tribe of Clock Tinkering” MONKEES”

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