@ Madamoiselle Prime Minister Mottley
“To whom much is given it is said much is expected…”
As I sat to write this for submission on Barbados Underground, I pondered long about a name for this article.
And even longer on what I was going to put in it since it was NOT WRITTEN to sow a feeling OR fear of a “Night of The Long Knives” but to genuinely engage with the leader of this administration and more particularly highlight the skills of those you have surrounded yourself with.
And Yes, it is indeed a presumption to assume that a lowly citizen might pen a letter to their Prime Minister, but mine is the constant hope that “gods in Mt. Olympus might entertain mere men in midguard.”
For there to be a “Mottleyan LEGACY”, I humbly suggest that your focus HAS TO BE ON THE BAJAN PEOPLE. It CANNOT BE one that is superficial or designed to be a “sleight of hand” exercise and even things like seducing simple pensioners through a promise of a $75 per month increase in pensions, in their right hand, INSTANTLY NULLIFIED by a sewerage levy of $30/mth, taken from their left hand, speaks to a disturbing start out of the blocks especially when that increase is further depleted by commensurate levies on things like the kerosene may pensioners use in stoves and lamps.
It is ten years now that the people or Barbados have been suffering intensely under the DLP but that “suffering” has been going on for much longer than 10 years.
This suffering IS NOT the overt poverty of 5,000 pit toilets which you spoke of removing during your government’s tenure. No Madamoiselle.
By the way, you do know that an “Adopt a Pit Toilet ” or appropriately named social partnership programme, underwritten by businesses or corporations, where tax write-offs will be offered, IN LIEU OF PART OF THAT 5% TAX INCREASE, would eradicate said toilet pits in 1 year!
No, de ole man is speaking of an “entrenched suffering and disenfranchisement”, a creeping miasma THAT HAS ENVELOPED THE COLLECTIVE BAJAN PSYCHE, and, for at least 4 administrations, has contributed to, and has impaled our nation – INERT AND IMPOTENT.
Madamoiselle Prime Minister, I am sure that you can see that Bajans have become a nation of “merchandisers OR consumers” we are either one or the other. A fact that your IMF counterparts have gone to pains to state in their Reports.
And there is no place, nor initiative, nor enabling agency that fosters innovation or meaningful “otherness” to break that mould.
And please, do not proffer the inert Enterprise Growth Fund nor the Access Fund corpses or many other pretty named cadavers as innovation facilitators cause $5,000 non collateralized loans is not innovation or meaningful “otherness”.
YOUR AUDITS which you call ” Phase 3 ” of your administration’s proposed actions, those which you declare will see “a continuation of the review of these state owned entities (I should mention though that those two EGFL and Fun Access are “personally owned” and not SOEs heheheheh) they will only confirm that these personal serfdoms CONTINUE TO ACT as enemies to the state and should be immediately disbanded like the guerilla terrorists they are.
Now i would ask you this question only hoping you could answer it? (Not “would” cause I doubt that de ole man is of the ILK to attract your answer)
Do you know, OR HAVE PEOPLE WHO KNOW, how to foster THEN NURTURE that “otherness”, whether it is tangibles or intangibles, assets that are of the calibre and national value that Barbados is seeking?
I am speaking of “tangible intangibles” like Rihanna who, i hasten to add, is “the exception to the rule”, A CHANCE HAPPENING, one which was not fostered nor nurture through anything proactively designed OR planned by Barbados
It was evident to all that your recent mini budget lacked any real proposals from your thought leaders that offset the dire state of the economy
And, coupled with your choices in the Senate, one fears what your “third tier” or what I call “shadow government” will deliver, your “thought leadership teams” AND THE IDEAS THAT ARE SURFACING
DE OLE MAN goes on record to say that one fears the “pretend arrangements, and sweetheart deals” that are appearing. Take for example that BPI and BMTI pre-arrangement. These structures WILL NOT EMPOWER THE CITIZENS OF BARBADOS, will not breed ANYTHING THAT WILL REDOUND TO YOUR LEGACY AND CERTAINLY PROMOTE THIS NATION
And in parting de ole man will leave these words with you. (again there goes that presumption heheheheh…)
BAJANS ARE NOT STUPID ANY MORE, WE ARE WAKING UP
If the lesson, of how we THE PEOPLE, have voted out the late Errol Walton Barrow, from St John on May 24th 2018, is lost on you AND THE REST OF THE BLP, then I encourage you, AND YOUR COLLEAGUES, including Hartley and Peter, to continue on in prosecution of this thread of SHIFTING CONSTANTLY INCREASING TAXES to the said people while dividing up what has become “THE FATTED COW”, what the DLP previously called The FATTED Calf.
Continue in this thread and you will see how long you ride in MP1, and sojourn at Llaro Court …
Your humble servant
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