Submitted by David Comissiong, President, Clement Payne Movement of Barbados

Dear Sir / Madam,

I wish to remind Barbadians that it is not only the usual Afrocentric activists such as Trevor Marshall, Anthony “Mighty Gabby” Carter, Sir Hilary Beckles and David Comissiong who have been persistently calling for the removal of the Lord Nelson statue from its central and prestigious location in our capital city of Bridgetown.

In the year 1999 the then Barbados Government established a governmental “National Heroes Square and Gallery Development Committee” to consider and decide upon this issue of the correct location of the Nelson statue (among other issues).

I was a member of that National Committee.

The Committee held three Town Hall meeting on the issue and also solicited and received scores of written submissions from the people of Barbados.

In May 2000 the Committee issued its Report and recommended the REMOVAL and RELOCATION of the Nelson statue to one of two possible alternative locations.

The Committee also recommended that the statue be immediately taken down and kept in storage pending its relocation, lest it provoke “public controversy.” (See page 15 of the Report)

Membership of the Committee consisted of several very eminent and qualified Barbadians.

Sadly and regrettably the Recommendation of the Committee on the Nelson Statue has never been implemented.

I say that it is never too late to do the right thing, and hereby Call upon the present Government to take immediate steps to implement the recommendation of this National Committee by removing the Nelson Statue from its current prominent location in the heart of our capital city.

PLEASE  FIND  THE  RELEVANT  EXTRACT  OF  THE  REPORT  ATTACHED  HERETO.

233 responses to “Re-Defacing of NELSON Statue in Bridgetown”

  1. NorthernObserver Avatar

    Congrats SS. I didn’t grow one shite myself, but making them anyways. And I like raisins, though my mother swore against their use.


  2. Hate is a deep and extreme emotional dislike of an individual, groups, entities, objects, behaviors, or ideas. Hate is associated with feelings of anger, disgust and a disposition towards hostility. It can be a contagious poison of the mind and is often stronger than the opposite social emotion of love. It is a form of frustration and animosity which churns within the subject but establishes no relationship with the world, other than an aimless desire for destruction. Hate eats at the emotional well-being of the hater reducing their capacity to love and to be part of a community.
    The Holy Bible, whether you are a believer or not, can be an excellent source of knowledge and understanding and this instructs us as follows “whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer(in their mind) and you know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in himself”. Why then do so many writers in our press demonstrate such tangible and evident hate dripping with emotion? Can this be just a mental hangover?
    I once stumbled across a small town in another country where the products of inbreeding were hidden away. I was appalled and marveled that my tiny country Barbados and its small gene pool has no such products. Instead we demonstrate a hybrid vigour with more talent of every form and description per capita (scientists, professors, doctors, lawyers, athletes et al) than any other country in the World. This was borne out at a recent function when I realised that all of the 100s present were of mixed race, mainly dark but a range of hues. Why then is there such hate? Why are we not embracing this capacity in the building of a future for our children and our country?

  3. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    Vincent Haynes November 30, 2017 at 1:54 PM Dr SS PhD You may have point…this king only on 14…

    So a king has 14 wives? So what? Kings do what kings do.

    How many children, grandchildren, pounds and palaces does Queen Lizzie have? How many does Vincent or Simple Simon have?

    The rich and powerful are different.

    You know that.

    But the commonplace 100 wives thing will NEVER work

    Try as you might, you damn lucky to get even one wife. If you have one, treat she right, ’cause if she leaves you may NEVER get another one.

  4. Bernard Codrington Avatar
    Bernard Codrington

    PL T at 1 : 50 pm

    Your submissions have not addressed my questions. You have further confounded the issues. How can The Slave Code of 1661 be responsible for the lateness of Bajans at meetings ? Are you serious? Luckily for me at places where I worked , Bajans turned up on time. Moreover, many of these places were publicly owned corporations.

    Peter you have to do better than this. From him to whom much is given,much is expected.

    When I look in my mirror I see the present me. I do not see the past me. It simply is not possible.
    History is for our learning. If you do not know and understand history, you are condemned to repeat it. Even that is a half truth.

    You are saying because it happened in the past ,this is the explanation for doing it in the present ; even though the situations in time and space are different. That to me is utter rubbish.
    That is the recipe for irresponsible behaviour.

  5. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @Peter Lawrence Thompson November 30, 2017 at 2:26 PM

    Agreed. My old man taught a good day’s work, for a good day’s pay. Excellent advice. He was a very wise man.

  6. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @NorthernObserver November 30, 2017 at 2:41 PM “I like raisins, though my mother swore against their use.”

    Fortunately in this world the raisin lovers, and the raisin haters can still live together in amity.

    Lol.


  7. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. November 30, 2017 at 2:07 PM #

    @Peter Lawrence Thompson November 30, 2017 at 1:50 PM “Why do Bajans refuse to be on time for anything? meetings, fetes, they are certain to be late for their own funeral. Has this not puzzled you?”
    It was a form of resistance.

    Wrong. Plse do some reading on the history .. and philosophy of time. It is part of the history of mathematics.


  8. Peter is a confessed atheist!!

    He will not address the Bible!!

    As far as lateness is concerned, the factory siren sounded at 7:30, people went to work.

    It sounded at 11:30 and people sat down for lunch.

    It sounded at 4:30 and people went home!!!

    Before steam which ran the siren, the bell in the Millwall or on a building kept time!!

    Bajans were always punctual.


  9. It was a form of resistance.
    Shakespeare’s schoolboy went unwillingly to school, because he did not want to go to school.
    Bajans went unwillingly to work because they did not want to go to work all day in the hot sun for no wages.
    Why would any sensible person willingly work all day in the hot sun for no wages.
    Would you?
    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    You claim to grow cassava and give it away for free.

    How do you manage that without going out in the sun?

    How many slaves do you have?


  10. Wrong. Plse do some reading on the history .. and philosophy of time. It is part of the history of mathematics.
    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    I guess mathematics does not originate in Africa!!

  11. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @Peter webster November 30, 2017 at 2:42 PM “Why then is there such hate? :

    Who say anything about hate?

    If we chastise John and Vincent because they are wrong it does not mean that we hate them. It means that we love them and we want to bring them to a Christian understanding because they are capable of being/doing better.

    Remember the same Bible says in Hebrews 12:6-11 “For whom the LORD loves He chastens”

    We as God’s disciples chasten John and Vincent because we love them, we do not want them to continue in wrong. We do not want them to be consigned to the eternal flames when they die.

    What hate?


  12. .John November 30, 2017 at 3:11 PM #

    I guess mathematics does not originate in Africa!!

    Is this a question?

    V

  13. Well Well & Cut N' Paste At Your Service Avatar
    Well Well & Cut N’ Paste At Your Service

    “When I look in my mirror I see the present me. I do not see the past me. It simply is not possible.”

    When racists look in the mirror, they also see the present while smugly using the practices of the past thinking it will last forever, but if they look a little closer. ..they usually see the past catching up.

  14. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @Bernard Codrington November 30, 2017 at 2:49 PM “When I look in my mirror I see the present me. I do not see the past me. It simply is not possible.”

    You know that that is not true. You Bernard are the product of your two parents, and your four grandparents etc. I am sure that you have some of their physical, psychological, and emotional, characteristics. We can never be entirely ourselves. NEVER.

    Once in a big northern city I was walking across a parking lot at a mega mall and a strange man stopped me and said “you are so and so’s sibling”, calling one of my much older brothers, his schoolmate by name.”

    How did that happen?

    I was so surprised. Not anymore.

    In our family there is an adopted child. When she grew up and met her natural mother they were working in the same field, a field that is traditionally male dominated and involves a high level of spatial intelligence.

    How did that happen? I am no longer surprised.

    Please note that nobody in the adopted family has any spatial intelligence at all. Once the adopted mother, only a teenager back then, got lost in her own bedroom. Lol.

  15. Well Well & Cut N' Paste At Your Service Avatar
    Well Well & Cut N’ Paste At Your Service

    “Why then is there such hate? ”

    Have you ever asked the real architects of that hate the question…I am sure you had countless opportunities…but never asked….so why didnt you…..they reside in UK North America and Europe.., ya can start in buckingham palace..

    What we are doing is addressing and confronting issues to find solutions…

    There are still the elderly harbingers of that hate around that you can ask that question….but it is not us…..so dont miss the opportunity. ….to ask them why the hate, why they live, breath and consumed hate for centuries…, then passed it on generation after generation for over 10 generations.

    ….go ask them before like their hatefilled ancestors, they too are forced to leave the earth.

    Why would you ask us anyway.


  16. No Hal!!

    Just an observation given the various assertions that Barbadians don’t keep time!!


  17. Bajans have gotten lazy and undisciplined, that’s all.

    There is no need to arrive at a party on time.

    Food is often served late and people stay for ever.

    What has changed in Barbados is there are more and more parties and entertainments.

    The indiscipline of time keeping of the party or entertainment then spills over to other activities.

    It is like a drug, it dulls the sense of time.

    When 7:30, 11:30 and 4:30 worked, people worked hard and slept well.

    Saturday was the day/night for entertainment and Sunday Church.

    Bajans were punctual, often early for Church.

    It is all about discipline.

    Probably why productivity is so low.


  18. Resistance, ha ha …. my great toe!!

  19. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @John November 30, 2017 at 3:10 PM “You claim to grow cassava and give it away for free.”

    A Simple Response: True. Okras too, and avocados and spinach and breadfruit and mangoes. Mine to grow, mine to eat, mine to sell, mine to give away if i feel like it. Mine, mine, mine.

    @John November 30, 2017 at 3:10 PM “You claim to grow cassava and give it away for free.”How do you manage that without going out in the sun?

    I NEVER said that I do not go out in the sun. I DO work in the sun almost every day. As I approach 70 I did 14 hours in the sun last week. BUT I do this voluntarily. Nobody is forcing me. Nobody can force me. I do the work. I get the benefits. Exercise, good food, and some cash

    @John November 30, 2017 at 3:10 PM How many slaves do you have?
    No slaves John. Zero slaves. None. Occasionally I hire a labourer, we work together and I pay him the going rate of $100 BDS per day.

  20. Well Well & Cut N' Paste At Your Service Avatar
    Well Well & Cut N’ Paste At Your Service

    Dr. Simple….these people are not living in reality…they still believe it’s slavery time, people who clean houses these days get paid 70 dollars for 5 hours of work, all day would be 140.00..

    …….tell the Johns and Vincents slavery is over….they dont seem to know…

    The population on the island really have to give these neanderthals a wake up call….stop working for all of them.


  21. It is the fake Dr. who pays $100 vs the $140 you opine should be a day’s work!!


  22. Agricultural work is the most fulfilling work there is going around.

    I do it for free regularly and enjoy it!!

  23. Well Well & Cut N' Paste At Your Service Avatar
    Well Well & Cut N’ Paste At Your Service

    John…I said cleaning house 140.00 for a full days work…

    Dr. Simple can only pay the amount she was quoted for a full day of agricultural work…

    Suppose the helper cleaning the house has a 5 bedroom house to clean.

    Yall need to stop with the slavery shit….it will now destroy you just as it once enriched you.

  24. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @John November 30, 2017 at 4:07 PM “It is the fake Dr. who pays $100 vs the $140 you opine should be a day’s work!!”

    Did I say that I stand over the man with a whip and make him work 8 hours in the hot sun?

    Stupssseee!!!

    That said I have paid an occasional labourer up to $250 BDS per day, because of superior work.

    The Bible at 1 Timothy 5:18 says that a labourer is worthy of his hire.

    Just wages.

    Reparations due for 200+ years of unpaid labour


  25. Hmmm…..some very interesting contributions from those that wish to rewrite history, settle scores of past wrongs and create a utopian society.

    Some can be dismissed as idiots and lost souls….thankfully the majority of present Bimmers do not attach any credence to their vapid mouthings.

    But…..SimpleSimon…you who should know better joining with that bunch and talking rubbish are a sore disappointment…..you simply refuse to reason as evinced by your harping on the 100 wives,a point that I said in the 14 wives post that you were probably correct on.

    You refuse to understand that time waits for no person and marches on continuously.i.e. the sons and daughters of the field workers are now holding excellent positions all over the world.

    Likewise that the deterioration of Bim has nothing to do with black&white but moreso with inept governance.

    You refuse to acknowledge the cross fertilisation of tribes in Bim and their worthwhile progeny to the past development of Bim and hopefully its future.

    Instead you have decided to re-invent the wheel of the 60s and create strife based on skin colour and the removal of all things of the colonial past…..yet refuse to throw out the laws,destroy all construction prior to 66 and destroy all the colonial titles and trappings.

    What a lost bunch devoid of the ability to reason or understand history.


  26. Heard it is raining sideways in Bim, this happened last year too, wunnah know a good obeah man (or woman)?


  27. S/B sideways in Bim on Independence Day


  28. Vincent Haynes November 30, 2017 at 4:30 PM #

    There is an intellectual decline in Barbados that is embarrassing. Even our trained historians do not seem to understand the difference between the history of ideas and the ideas of history.

    .


  29. Hal Austin November 30, 2017 at 4:46 PM #

    You are so correct….it saddens me and they have inculcated a bunch psuedo historians with creating the myth of ones past to fit a narrative they wish to promulgate that obviously bares no relationship to the truth.

    …case in point the mythical side kick of Washington Pitt Franklyn…created for the sole purpose of having a bona fide African dying a martyrs death for the “cause”,could not have a fair skinned mullato being the protagonist…..oh no.

    ….note they had options of other African freed men who were business moguls at that time e.g. Joseph Rangel or London Bourne and could have been the inspiration of how to turn adversity around…..but that is not their message.

    They wish to take a leaf out of the mythical Willy Lynch’s book…..divide and rule.

  30. Well Well & Cut N' Paste At Your Service Avatar
    Well Well & Cut N’ Paste At Your Service

    Besides. ..the table has turned and none of you noticed, but the victors are not interested in slaves,
    .or race hatred or denigrating anyone…. we have a higher spiritual intellect…that is what we came blessed with….very few people are cognizant of these spiritual attributes.

  31. Bernard Codrington Avatar
    Bernard Codrington

    @ Vincent at4:46 PM

    Well said. Very selective in their information gathering. Dr Goebbels could not have done better.


  32. @Bernard Codrington at 2:49 PM
    “How can The Slave Code of 1661 be responsible for the lateness of Bajans at meetings ?” This is a question that you provided the answer to yourself: “Only you can deliver yourself from mental slavery.” I cannot really make it any clearer. Trauma affects a culture and a culture is transmitted between generations… this is basic stuff… I’m not sure why you pretend not to understand. Of course there are lots of Bajans who have escaped that self defeating cultural pattern… I am glad that you are one such, but not enough people have escaped to change the overall damaging effect on Bajan productivity.

  33. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @ Hal Austin November 30, 2017 at 3:04 PM

    “Wrong. Plse do some reading on the history .. and philosophy of time. It is part of the history of mathematics.”

    Is this a Freudian slip or what? We believe you have the blind mule before the box-cart on this one.

    You ought to have said that mathematics forms part of the ‘history and philosophy’ of TIME.

    Time is incomparable; and to speak in such euhemeristically banal language clearly reveals your inchoate ‘association’ with this cosmological sphere of human knowledge and scientific endeavour.

    Please try to stick to your Judeo-Christian anthropomorphic tale of Creation as your horizon in your struggle with the concept of time and leave it to the likes of Bush Tea whose intellectual pay-grade for this high level job is stratospheric when compared to yours.

    Why not see TIME as the Universal God and mathematics as ITS ‘mode’ of communicating with what has been left in its unending cosmological trail.


  34. @Hal Austin at 3:04 PM
    “Wrong. Plse do some reading on the history .. and philosophy of time. It is part of the history of mathematics.”

    Been there done that. My assertion stands… the cultural pattern of chronic lateness is of course not unique to Barbados or the Caribbean, it is an expression of passive-aggressive behaviour rooted in feelings of powerlessness and fear. We will not tackle it effectively as a culture until we deal with the underlying feelings of powerlessness and fear.


  35. BC

    Chuckle…..I await your response to Peters pandering post @5.53 PM to you….he has a definite superiority complex.


  36. Vincent Haynes November 30, 2017 at 6:02 PM
    “I await your response to Peters pandering post”

    Pandering, verb, gerund or present participle of pander
    1. furnishing clients for a prostitute or supplying persons for illicit sexual intercourse;
    2. catering to or profiting from the weaknesses or vices of others.
    3. being a go-between in amorous intrigues.

    Are you perfectly sure, Vincent, that my post was “pandering?”

    I’m really confused. Am I supposed to be furnishing clients for illicit intercourse to you or to Bernard? What weakness or vice of other people (you? Bernard?) am I profiting from? Are you and Bernard having an amorous intrigue?? If so please leave me out of the equation… I do not wish to be a go between.


  37. Forgive Vincent… poor fella…

    He was pandering to retarded Hal …and jumped into the deep end of the pool on this blog.
    Now he is scrambling for some air…. and rambling all over the place.

    It is always uncomfortable for fellows who barely grasp decimals to jump into discussions on advance calculus….

    See if you can toss him a line…. please.


  38. Bushie

    Cuhdear……dah ez de bes yuh cud do….wuhloss……no pep no vim……wha happen de bushtea end wukkin……haha….po fellah.

  39. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @Vincent Haynes November 30, 2017 at 4:30 PM “destroy all construction prior to 66…”

    Where did I say or even imply this? You really should stop trying to put dishonest words in my mouth.

    The house in which I was born, and the banana copse under which my navel string is LITERALLY buried were all in place prior to 1966. I have no desire to destroy my family home [replaced the roof, did some other repairs and put a nice coat of paint on it just 2 years ago. I love that place], nor yours nor John’s.

    But the old Admiral? Time for him to go. Nobody ’bout here loves him.

    And you really need to stop telling lies on me.

    I int dead yet.

  40. Theophilius Gazerts 233 Avatar
    Theophilius Gazerts 233

    Good night to all.
    Surprisingly, I have a liking for John even though he is dead wrong on everything. John was probably a young lad in a ‘good family” who has handed down a number of fairy tales. Perhaps, a senior member of his family did display kindness to the less fortunate and these acts made John believe those fairy tales.

    It is VH, that I cannot understand? How could one man be so devoid of pride? How could a man hate himself, his predecessors and his race so deeply? How can a man be so empty of ideas and consider himself as an intellect?

    If I was a psychiatrist, I would offer him free counseling, even though I believe that the cancer of self hated cannot be excised.

  41. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. Avatar
    Dr. Simple Simon Phd.

    @Vincent Haynes November 30, 2017 at 4:30 PM “destroy all the colonial titles…”

    Right after Nelson makes a big splash in the Careenage.

    In go the colonial titles right after him

    But we save the title holders. We don’t want to throw some toddlers beloved grandpa in the sea.

    But Nelson?

    He shouldda gone every since.

  42. Theophilius Gazerts 233 Avatar
    Theophilius Gazerts 233

    *hatred


  43. Dr SS
    The house in which I was born, and the banana copse under which my navel string is LITERALLY buried were all in place prior to 1966.
    +++++++++++++++++
    I thought that we had heard the last of the navel string when Adrian Hinds asked you to show him the tree where your navel string was buried so he “could piss on it.”


  44. The Bible at 1 Timothy 5:18 says that a labourer is worthy of his hire.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    How much does a politician charge us for his hire?

    Work it out on a daily basis and compare the output you get with your labourer for $100.00.

    You will see you are shortchanging your labourer and one day his descendants will be after your descendants for reparations … unpaid wages!!

  45. Well Well & Cut N' Paste At Your Service Avatar
    Well Well & Cut N’ Paste At Your Service

    Vincent is reaching….he did not expect his master plan for the majority population to unravel so fast……accelerated by one of his own brainwashed minority idiots….just in time for independence day…….

    …… in the blink of an eye POOF…it was all gone…lol

    .I told thèm that dark place where they walk will destroy them….they laughed, the spirits are all aligned and waiting.

    And it has not even started fully yet.


  46. Dr. Simple Simon Phd. November 30, 2017 at 8:26 PM #

    Chuckle….this post really describes you and your ilk….all duppy possessed by the one armed,one eyed servant of his king…..none so blind as those who refuse to see…..go blightly on your way.


  47. Some comedy from the US on race!!


  48. John- I guess mathematics does not originate in Africa!!

    The British museum is to come under renewed pressure to give up leading treasures as 16 countries plan to sign a declaration that demands the return of artefacts sent overseas generations ago….The Telegraph, 2010.

    The artefacts include papyri/ books from Ancient Egypt on mathematics( see, Rhind Paprus), medicine, spirituality, the Ancient Egyptian leather rule, bronze statues from Benin, a golden crown from Ethiopia, etc.


  49. ra1

    Everyone knows that mathematics originated in Kemet except for the discovery of zero which apparently the greeks added when they plagiarised the works found in Kemet.


  50. British museums & private collections are full of looted treasures & artefacts form Africa.

    The Sphinx of Taharqo is a granite statue of a sphinx with the face of Taharqo. He was a Nubian king of the 25th Egyptian Dynasty  (747-656 BC) & rulers of the Kingdom of Kush. It resides in the British Museum in London.

    Crown of Ethiopia, 1740, also resides in British Museum ( Museum no. M.27-2005) , it of gold alloyed with silver and copper with filigree work, glass beads, pigment and gilded copper. The Crown of Ethiopia, 1740 along with manuscripts, regalia, religious antiquities and other material – from the imperial treasury and from the Church of the Saviour of the World were looted from Emperor Tewodros’s Fortress, Magdala, Ethiopia by Richard Holmes ( assistant in the department of manuscripts at the British Museum) & British troops in 1868.

Leave a Reply to NorthernObserverCancel reply

Trending

Discover more from Barbados Underground

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading