est. 2007

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Sagicor and Scotiabank Signal the Caribbean Market

The blogmaster received several messages yesterday from members of the BU family whicch highlighted two financial transactions choking local, regional and some internation newsfeeds. The decision by Scotiabank to shed operations in nine Caribbean islands should hardly be a surprise to those who make it a business to keep ears to the ground. The region…

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The blogmaster received several messages yesterday from members of the BU family whicch highlighted two financial transactions choking local, regional and some internation newsfeeds.

The decision by Scotiabank to shed operations in nine Caribbean islands should hardly be a surprise to those who make it a business to keep ears to the ground. The region has become a hot mess regarding the state of economies and with de-risking high on the agenda of financial institutions the risk appetite of international banks operating in the region has reached an intolerable level. At some point in the future they will completely withdraw from a region to focus on bigger markets.

The acquisition of Sagicor shares by Canadian company Alignvest for 536 million dollars- reportedly to create the opportunity to efficiently raise capital by listing in a more liquid market to drive growth is the other mega transaction closed this week. The following statement by Sagicor’s Chief Operating Officer Ravi Rambarran about how regional stock exchanges operate is instructive:-

At the same time, our stock markets in the Caribbean are very thin and very illiquid. We saw just last week Friday someone sold 700 Sagicor sales out of 306.3 million shares and drove the price down to about USD1.00 That means all the other shareholders who have their stock had to value their stock at this price. That is a reflection of our stock market being very thin and very illiquid.

We look forward to a debate led by our educated class to inform a general public who are in the main disinterested and ignorant about these kinds of transaction. A shame!

162 responses to “Sagicor and Scotiabank Signal the Caribbean Market”

  1. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    Late to the party but let me comment on employee owning stocks.

    Many established companies, in order to be competitive and to attract employees, have stock payments (RSU or options) as part of the compensation package. Indeed, with the stock market performing well, many employees would willingly take a ‘slightly’ lower base pay if the awards/options are large enough.

    For technology start-ups which are often strapped for cash, many employees are willing to take the chance of the company stock offering making them millionaires (in some case overnight) and will accept stocks as part of their salary.

  2. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    “Parros selling family assets in order to look rich and live big for a short time”.

    Sometimes I wonder if we are not selling our birthrights for a mess of pottage.

    I don’t want to go down the rabbit hole where some will throw around big words and technical term and at the end of it the value of their contribution is questionable. This is not my area of expertise, but I cannot sit here and wait for the next shoe to drop..

    Before it drops cannot government attempt to identifying what company or companies are most likely to pull the next ‘disappearing’ act?( If just money is the end goal, can we attempt to attempt to push them toward local ownership (shares of stocks? With interest rates being negligible or zero there should be investors enthusiasm for stocks …..

    But of course it is a catch-22… some think the local stock market is rigged; the management of these companies are looking out for themselves and large shareholders,… so any preemptive action by government may be just kicking the can down the road …

    We dead.

    This may be above my pay grade …

  3. David Avatar
    David

    ECCB Reviewing Application To Acquire Scotiabank’s ECCU Operations
    By Staff Writer – December 1, 20181

    The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) has confirmed receiving an application from Republic Financial Holdings, seeking regulatory approval to acquire the Bank of Nova Scotia’s operations and businesses in the Eastern Caribbean Currency Union (ECCU).

    An ECCB statement said the application was received on Tuesday, 27 November.

    According to the ECCB, pursuant to the Banking Act, it has commenced its review of this application.

    Scotia announced this week that it will be pulling its banks out of Guyana, St Maarten and the Eastern Caribbean territories of Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines.

    The ECCB disclosed that it has held initial discussions with the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago and the Bank of Guyana on the application by Republic Financial Holdings to acquire Scotiabank’s operations.

    “These regulators will collaborate on the review of this application. The ECCB will also confer with the Central Bank of St Maarten and Curacao,” the statement from the bank explained.

    It noted that the ECCB already regulates Republic Bank since it has an operation in Grenada and Republic also has a stake in a bank in Saint Lucia.

    However the statement said it has come to the attention of the ECCB that there is some speculation that Republic’s acquisition of Scotiabank’s operations in the ECCU could lead to the depletion of the foreign reserves that back the EC dollar.

    “Such speculation is unfounded and unhelpful,” the ECCB stated.

    “The ECCB is clear and resolute about its mandate to protect the EC dollar and wishes to make it abundantly clear that it will continue to maintain very high levels of foreign reserves as it has done for the past 35 years.”

    “The proposed acquisition has prompted discussion about the ownership of banking assets in the ECCU. At present, 55 per cent of banking assets are owned by three Canadian banks and Republic Financial Holdings and 45 per cent of banking assets are owned by indigenous (national) banks. The proposed acquisition, if approved, would not fundamentally change that ownership distribution, as 55 per cent of the banking assets would be owned by two Canadian banks and Republic Financial Holdings and 45 per cent of the banking assets would continue to be owned by our indigenous (national) banks,” the ECCB statement explained.

    It said that from time to time, there will be changes in ownership of banks.

    “Indeed, the proposed transaction is the latest in a series of consolidation moves by the Canadian banks. It is distinctly possible that there could also be some consolidation moves among indigenous (national) banks. Citizens and residents in the ECCU should come to expect these developments as part of the banks’ response to both global developments and competition in the ECCU banking space. Indeed, the ECCB continues to encourage indigenous (national) banks to cooperate and consolidate to ensure the interests of the people of the ECCU are best served,” the financial institution stated.

    The ECCB urged citizens of and residents in the ECCU to remain calm and stay abreast of developments in the banking sector.

  4. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    THE DOOR HAS BEEN LEFT OPEN for Sagicor to accept an acquisition offer better than the US$536 million one now on the table from Canadian company Alignvest Acquisition II Corporation.

    http://www.nationnews.com/nationnews/news/219479/offers

  5. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    There are no measurable differences between Sagicor and CLICO.

    We are seeing, in real time, what we have long predicted as the inevitable. The raiding of a popularly owned, but not controlled, organization and its privatization to benefit elite forces.

    What David sees as ‘de-risking’ is a misnomer. We have been, for years, trying to tell him what is happening in economy but he obviously prefers to rely on the traditional shareholders of misinformation.

    David like Dodridge Miller would not last more than one quarter in a real listed company, in a leading market. For both share price and dividends at Sagicor have now been either flat, non-existent or declining for many years.

    This last hooray is merely an attempt at an exit strategy for institutional shareholders. In so doing a ‘boiler room’ will now be seeking to ‘pump and dump’ the shares so that the large owners of stock who made deals over the years to buy blocks, almost illegally, can now cash-in as management continues to be as feckless as the wider culture allows.

    So is the financialization of economy.

    On the issue of the Bank of Nova Scotia, both technology and financialization have so altered the industry that there are too many branches charging too high fees not to expect much less of a physical presence.

    Another thing about financialization of economy is that ‘high street banks’ no longer lend in the traditional ways.

  6. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    The reference to derisking refers to banking and the challenge for local entities to be players.

  7. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David

    Again you are wrong! A withdrawal from local markets does not equate to increased concentration in larger markets.

    That kind of thinking is Keynesian and will not be allowed to die.

    For the same features you are seeing in this local market also characterize the so-called larger markets. Given the ability of financial markets and institutions to move money across borders, quite easily, we are surprised at this judgement.

    These dynamics CANNOT be properly explained using a dated logic. Meaning, something else has been happening and needs a new logic.

  8. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    From all the public writings on the matter the appetite to operate in small countries – without scale – in the region by large companies has diminished. We can debate if this is an accurate position.

  9. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David

    You are too close to your own environment to not drink that cool aid.

    Why not take a trip to New York, London, Tokyo and you will see any number of traditional banking institutions operating under capacity, depending on high fees instead of traditional operations, in order to survive, etc

    We have been saying that all the terms of reference in coming to what you have determined to be a generalized conclusion are wrong, notwithstanding the perceived preponderance of anecdotal evidence. or even statistical evidence.

    And if you want to double down on that determination then you will have to explain the differentials in scale or scope at the height of maximum expansion of international banks in the Caribbean region and at this time.

    It would seem to us that the region has not gotten any smaller. Some may argue that there has been population, demand, economic expansion supporting banking and financial services.

    So if scale is no smaller, then other factors are more likely causal. Why do you insist on keeping your head in the sand?

  10. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    Name the institutions let us do the deep dive.

  11. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    @ Pacha
    Boss, have you not yet realised that most here DO NOT HAVE THE EYES to see …or the ears to hear,
    the reality of the situation we presently face…?
    These albino-centric institutions have seen the end of their ‘glory’ days.
    Like all pyramid schemes, they reach the stage of inevitable collapse – and this is where we are now…

    CLICO went early because it was run by PARTICULARLY stupid and arrogant people.
    But Sagicor is no real different kettle of fish… NOR are any of the other institutions.

    Our problems are MUCH MORE fundamental than economic leadership – or even good management.
    Our foundational systems are fundamentally flawed…. and they WILL collapse …. or rather…ARE collapsing.

    Our best bet is to face REALITY and to take sensible evasive actions.

  12. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    Scale is of little consequence in the overall scheme of things … except that larger scale allows the greedy and selfish to rob many more people …much more quickly, than is possible in smaller populations.
    They just rise higher ….and crash much more badly.

    All construction requires a sound foundation.
    Selfishness and greed are NOT sound foundations on which to build empires.
    Until we understand that FACT …and that unrelenting SPIRITUAL LAW,
    we will continue to experience catastrophic failures in our major – and minor – institutions.

  13. David Avatar
    David

    @Bush Tea

    There is a reality both of you ignore, we are up to our necks in debt, to stabilize to repay the debt and target infrastructure improvements we have to borrow more money. The DLP and previous governments kicked the can down the road. Last time the blogmaster checked Mia and anyoto come are not magicians.

    We are in a lose lose position.

  14. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    We are in a lose lose position.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++
    Duh !!!

    How long has Bushie been preaching this?
    …not ever since Caswell REFUSED to BUP?

    It is what the bushman means by ‘GRASS for our donkeys…. WITH plimplers.’
    …and that goes PARTICULARLY so for those up North in Albino-Central….
    Not just us Bajan brass bowls.

  15. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    RE we are up to our necks in debt, to stabilize to repay the debt and target infrastructure improvements we have to borrow more money.

    WHAT IGNORANCE!
    WHO BORROWS TO REPAY THEIR DEBTS
    THE FIRST THING I TAUGHT MY SONS IS TO AVOID ANYTHING IN WHICH YOU HAVE TO PAY INTEREST UNLESS THE THING YOU BORROWED FOR IS WORTH MUCH MORE THAN WHAT YOU BORROWED AND THAT IT GENERATES MUCH MORE THAN THE INTEREST YOU NEED TO PAY

  16. David Avatar
    David

    The lose lose position because we have a government working to satisfy what is popular expectation and behaviour instead of unfreezing and building a new Barbados. With a 30-0 party (29-0) Mia has the opportunity to take a stab at razing everything. Will she? Will citizens intoxicated by consumption habits support her if she dares to try? Forget the yardfowls, they have to earn their grain. Forget the ignorant, they will always be with us.

  17. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David

    In the financial services and banking industry you could choose almost any major international retail bank. You could look at how its profits are being generated and the number of branches being closed, the relative level of full-time customer services personnel employed – for example Capital One, a NY based bank is a example. They have just started to advertise no-fee account services on most accounts, in TV ads.

    Also you may want to consider a comparative analysis with the fortunes, or misfortunes, of real economy retail big chain stores in the USA as well. Store such as seen here https://www.bankrate.com/lifestyle/major-retailers-shuttering-locations-in-2017/#slide=1

  18. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    ….we are up to our necks in debt, to stabilize to repay the debt and target infrastructure improvements we have to borrow more money.
    +++++++++++++++++
    Think about what you said here CAREFULLY…. (to REPAY the debt, we must BORROW more…)

    We find ourselves in deep water, we are getting tired of paddling and have run out of energy…
    Your ‘solution’ is to swim FURTHER out into DEEPER water – in exchange for a bowl of porridge to get us there…?

    Boss, if that is the plan, then we would do better to dive and relax…..

  19. David Avatar
    David

    We have to borrow to maintain infrastructure.

    We have to borrow to defend the peg.

    We have to borrow to repay loans coming due.

    We could go on to explain the perilous state we find ourselves.

    Your comment addresses the point how we should have avoided the current situation, the issue is that we have not been able to avoid it and have to deal with it.

    At a personal level it is analogous to Debt Consolidation Loans which have become very popular at the household level.

    You may have the last word.

  20. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    RE Forget the yardfowls, they have to earn their grain. Forget the ignorant, they will always be with us.
    HOW WILL THE YARDFOWLS EARN THEIR GRAIN WHEN THERE IS NOTHING AROUND TO BUY GRAIN

    AND EVEN THE IGNORANT HAVE THEIR RIGHT TO OPINE AND JOIN IN THE DISCUSSION, YOU NEVER KNOW HOW EXPRESSING THEIR VIEW MAY MAKE A DIFFERENCE. ah lie?

  21. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    we have a government working to satisfy what is popular expectation and behaviour
    instead of unfreezing and building a new Barbados
    ++++++++++++++++++
    BINGO !!!

    Bushie KNEW that you had the ONLY answer.
    See if you can get it to Mia…..
    Ask Enuff to communicate it…
    Mia ALWAYS takes his advice….

  22. David Avatar
    David

    @Bushie

    We are in a spot of bother.

  23. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    Bushie

    Yes, but sometimes we are unable to resist the urge to try convincing the ‘unbelievers’.

    It however gives us comfort that your inestimable intellect, foresight, wisdom could be brought to bear on the affairs of both man and the devil.

  24. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    IF POLITICIANS MANAGED THE NATION’S PURSE AS THEY DO THEIR’S THE NATION WOULD BE BETTER OFF

  25. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    @Pachamama December 3, 2018 10:45 AM

    RE Bushie

    It however gives us comfort that your inestimable intellect, foresight, wisdom could be brought to bear on the affairs of both man and the devil.

    TELL US THEN WHY IS IT THAT BARBADOS IS IN SO MUCH DEEP DOO DOO WHEN YOU HAVE THIS SAGE AROUND WITH inestimable intellect, foresight, wisdom THAT could be brought to bear on the affairs of both man and the devil.?

    WE KNOW DAT HE WORKS FOR THE DEVIL, AS YOU DO, BUT WHAT HAS HE DONE FOR MAN ANYWHERE OR THE NATION WITH ALL THIS inestimable intellect, foresight, wisdom THAT COMFORTS YOU SO

    AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING, AS ANOTHER DAT KNOWS EVATING BOUT EVATING

    JUST ASKING

  26. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    Georgie Porgie

    These matters are infinitely beyond the scope, even scale, of 11-plus boys, like yourself.

  27. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    @ Pacha
    “These matters are infinitely beyond the scope, even scale, of 11-plus boys, like yourself.”
    ++++++++++++++++++++++
    Truer words have NEVER been posted on BU in relation to our friend GP.
    However…
    He is not to be blamed.

    except for his blunt REFUSAL to accept the DEMONSTRATED folly of his accepted dogma…
    and of his flawed understanding – EVEN of those areas of which he profess expertise.

    Were he humble enough to accept his shortcomings (like Bushie chose to do long ago…)
    Who knows what could have been the result….?

    As to ” WHY IS IT THAT BARBADOS IS IN SO MUCH DEEP DOO DOO WHEN YOU HAVE THIS SAGE AROUND”…
    Bushie is not here to bring ‘peace and financial security’ …. but a WHACKER.

    Thanks to David of BU, the gasoline has been available, and the weeds and other shiite will be whacked as long as that fuel is in supply….after all..

    A Bushman has to do…what a bushman must do.

  28. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    RE A Bushman has to do…what a bushman must do
    ABSOLUTELY! YOU DO NOTHING BUT TALK SHITE

    I ASK AGAIN As to ” WHY IS IT THAT BARBADOS IS IN SO MUCH DEEP DOO DOO WHEN YOU HAVE THIS SAGE AROUND”…

    YOUR SILLY ANSWER IS CLEARLY UNSATISFACTORY AND NO ONE ON BU HAS THE GUTS TO TELL YOU SO

    Bushie is not here to bring ‘peace and financial security’ …. but a WHACKER.

    WHAT OR WHO IS YOUR WHACKER WHACKING?
    WITH WHAT RESULT? WITH WHAT PROGRESS VISIBLE OR INVISIBLE

    AS TO THE OTHER ASS PACHMAMA WHO KNOWS THAT “These matters are infinitely beyond the scope, even scale, of 11-plus boys,” SEEING THAT HE KNOW SO MUCH, WHAT DOES HE DO? WHAT HAS HE DONE EXCEPT THAT TALK SHITE AND LICK ASS?

    I JUST ASKING QUIETLY AND PEACEFULLY

  29. Vincent Codrington Avatar
    Vincent Codrington

    @Pachamama at 8:14 AM

    Welcome back. Where did you go though?
    I agree and have been promoting tor a longtime now on this blog and elsewhere that the current dynamics cannot be explained within the outdated models that is being used to understand and correct the apparent faults in the Barbadian economy.
    The environment has changed. We have to up our game. But I keep hearing the same old same old narratives.
    And Bush Tea is right. The fundamentals are wrong. Very wrong for us in the Caribbean. Sometimes I wonder if the players are aware of what games they are playing. The rules are not being written in the Caribbean. So the local players, despite their higher education ,are still behaving like operatives.

    Just my take.

  30. David Avatar
    David

    @Vincent

    Does Mia have the courage to dismantle it? If she tries it will be at her peril.

    We are definitely in a spot of bother.

  31. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    Does Mia have the courage to dismantle it?

    NO SHE ONLY HAS A BIG MOUT BUT NO COURAGE TO CHANGE NUTTIN

    If she tries it will be at her peril.

    HA HA DAT IS WHERE SHE DIFFERS FROM TRUMP WHO DARES TO TAKE ON DE SWAMP THE DUMBOCRATS THE RHINOS AND THE MORONS ON THE WORLD SCENE
    LIKE THE WOMAN IN GERMANY WHO DONT EVEN KNOW HOW TO PRONOUNCE HER NAME

  32. David Avatar
    David

    @Bush Tea

    Some of us understand quite well. The challenge is always how. Our politicians survive based on popularity. We have not been able to inspire the transformational leader required for the times. The blogmaster will never forget the one year the country was allowed to meander when Thompson was on deaths bed. It said a lot about us as a people just like it does today in the face of the problems we face.

  33. A. Dullard Avatar
    A. Dullard

    @ David
    Does Mia have the courage to dismantle it? If she tries it will be at her peril.
    We are definitely in a spot of bother.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++
    What brings about this change of outlook? What happened to all the hope? Hope Road getting ‘dig up’?

  34. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    RE We have not been able to inspire the transformational leader required for the times.

    LET SATAN’S SON BUSHTEA COME WITH HIS WHACKER TO WHACK THE BRASS BOWLS AND TALK SHITE

    THERE YOU HAVE the transformational leader required for the times, PRESIDENT OF THE WHACKER OR WHACK PARTY. MURDAH! OH SHIRT!

    RE We have not been able to inspire the transformational leader required for the times.

    DONT WE HAVE DAVID KING, EDITOR OF THE DAILY DRIVEL?

    SOLOMON SAY ENJOY LIFE YA HEAR?

    EVEN A NOBODY LIKE ME OF WHOM IT IS SAID “These matters are infinitely beyond the scope, even scale, of 11-plus boys, ” MURDAH

  35. Hal Austin Avatar
    Hal Austin

    @A. Dullard,

    Yo may recall when some of us thought that the new government should have been critiqued after 100 days, as is traditional, we were told to give them six months. That time is now up.
    What is the BLP vision for the future of Barbados? Are we going to have a robust debate?

  36. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    A. Dullard December 3, 2018 12:10 PM

    @ David
    Does Mia have the courage to dismantle it? If she tries it will be at her peril.
    We are definitely in a spot of bother.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++
    What brings about this change of outlook? What happened to all the hope? Hope Road getting ‘dig up’?

    DULLARD I ONCE HEARD A GRENADIAN CHICK AT CAVE HILL IN 1971 TELL A CLASSMATE IF YA LIVE IN HOPE YA MIGHT DEAD IN DESPAIR
    THE ONLY VALID HOPE (ELPIS) IS THE BLESSED ASSURANCE OF HEBREWS 6:19-20

    Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.

    CHRIST IS OUR ONLY HOPE

  37. David Avatar
    David

    As long as there is breath there is hope, it does not mean a pragmatic view goes true the window.

  38. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    RE Are we going to have a robust debate?

    A ROBUST DEBATE IMPLIES VALID POINTS FOR AND VALID POINTS AGAINST

    BUT ALL THE BLP HAVE RIGHT NOW IS SEVERAL VALID POINTS AGAINST

  39. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    A, Dullard ……………

    Has asked the right question/s.

    The answers have been and will always be that this culture cannot exist without the hope-mongering we have always seen. But political heavens were always illusive.

    What would be a better ‘opium of the masses’ than the intangibility of hope when in fact ‘hopelessness’ is the order of the day?

    How better can political parties convince a population that power should be so consolidated especially when they themselves know not and in any event care not and really want to serve elite interests.

  40. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    WHEREAS Dum spiro spero WAS A NICE SAYING BY Theocritus and Cicero, IN CONTEMPORARY BARBADOS WE MIGHT SAY ONLY THE DUMB SPEROS WHILE THEY SPIRO
    AT LEAST WUNNAH STILL GOT THE BEACH……..EVEN THOUGH NOT MY CHILDHOOD PLAYGROUND BEACH AT WORTHING IN DE 60’S FROM ST LAWRENCE TO CACRABANK

  41. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    Isn’t there a difference between hopelessness and hope?

    Isn’t the survival of humankind anchored to ‘hope’?

    How can any challenged be overcome if there is not the confidence that emits from hope.

    But we digress.

    >

  42. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    QUESTION What would be a better ‘opium of the masses’ than the intangibility of hope when in fact ‘hopelessness’ is the order of the day?

    ANSWER HOPE IN SOMETHING REAL! AND TANGIBLE!

  43. Simple Simon Avatar
    Simple Simon

    @Pachamama December 3, 2018 8:14 AM “These dynamics CANNOT be properly explained using a dated logic. Meaning, something else has been happening and needs a new logic.”

    Nothing else has been happening.

    Human beings are selfish and greedy.

    Human beings have always been selfish and greedy.

    Everyday human beings kill other human beings. Human beings sell other human beings, yes, still. Human beings eat other human beings.

    Nothing new here.

    Nothing new at all.

    Why do you seem surprised when people behave like the selfish, greedy, amoral animals that they are?

  44. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David

    We are well aware that this subject is central to your very being. We however, reject all notions of what you call ‘hope’ primarily because of what it has become. How it has been politicized historically, to deliver the reverse – hopelessness.

    So whether in politics, religion, economy, all merchant of ‘hope’ should be shot on sight just like the original people of the earth ‘did’ to the christian missionary insistent on invading the space of an aboriginal nation’s people, recently in India.

  45. Vincent Codrington Avatar
    Vincent Codrington

    @ Dr, Simple Simon at !2 :40 PM

    Greed may always be with man. The problem is that every time we find an antidote for greed it metamorphoses, like a virus ,into another form. We have to be forever vigilant.

  46. David Avatar
    David

    @Vincent

    Agree with you, in much the same way the addiction to consumption must be fed. We are unable to detox.

  47. Simple Simon Avatar
    Simple Simon

    @Pachamama December 3, 2018 12:43 PM “all merchant of ‘hope’ should be shot on sight just like the original people of the earth ‘did’ to the christian missionary insistent on invading the space of an aboriginal nation’s people, recently in India.”

    I don’t share Pachamama’s views that more bloodshed will fix anything, although I can’t say I blame the people who arrowed the young man in the Indian Ocean [not India. India claims the place but the people are their own people] recently, but apparently he believed that those people were “living in Satan’s last stronghold on earth”

    If he needed to find a stronghold of Satan he need not have travelled thousands of miles, he just needed to go to the nearest mass shooting in his own United States, and there he would have found Satanic American young men. He need not have broken and entered the home island of people thousands of miles from him A people who have never touched a single hair on the head of a Christian or American in 70,000 or so years.

    Foolish boy. There is an American institution which annually awards IgNobel prizes.

    I think that he deserves a posthumous IgNobel..

  48. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    @ David
    Some of us understand quite well. The challenge is always how. Our politicians survive based on popularity. We have not been able to inspire the transformational leader required for the times
    ++++++++++++++++++++++
    LOL
    Are you not putting at risk your optimistic demeanour which you have been using to be the “Devil’s Advocate” here on BU?
    “HOW”…. is the million dollar question.

    and…
    Inspirational leaders are special BLESSINGS from on high…. We DO have some…
    But mostly, Brass Bowls tend to crucify them….
    …or at least dismiss them as crazy….

  49. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    That is precisely what I’ve always said. Bajan brass bowls only like and respect other brass bowls. Anyone who is different is crucified and called crazy. These are the people who think outside of the box and could actually make a difference. So that is why I said to you last week that it is not that there is no-one to fix the mess we are in but that the wrong people always rise to the top. And Bajans always seem to think that the solution has to originate with the top.

    But I believe in breaking problems into little pieces and finding solutions that originate in the villages of Barbados and spread when success is proven. It takes longer but it prevents the feeling of being overwhelmed that actually tends to paralyse and prevent action.

  50. Georgie Porgie Avatar
    Georgie Porgie

    RE Inspirational leaders are special BLESSINGS from on high…. We DO have some…
    But mostly, Brass Bowls tend to crucify them….
    …or at least dismiss them as crazy….

    I KNOW THE FEELING
    I KNOW IT ONLY TOO WELL… MURDAH THAT IS A MAXIMUM

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