est. 2007

Barbados Underground

Bringing News and Opinions to the People

Sweet Drink Tizzy

In a country reported to have a high incidence rate of non communicable diseases one of the issues causing Bajan tongues to wag violently is the increase in the excise tax on ‘sweet drinks’. During last month’s budget presentation Prime Minister Mia Mottley decreed that effective 1 April 2022 (today) the excise tax on sweet drinks increases by 20%.

On the face of it one would have assumed the imposition of a sin tax in the prevailing circumstances should be accepted for what it is. Instead many Bajans are expressing that it is a revenue grab instead of part of a holistic approach to tackling the health of the nation. 

It seems ridiculous any government should have to legislate to encourage individuals to take responsibility for health decisions, such is the reality; people have to be protected from themselves. The government needs to tax citizens to ensure a balanced budget and at the same time implement effective policies to ensure there is a seamless relationship between achieving financial and non financial targets. Bad decisions taken by SOME Barbadians ultimately effect ALL Barbadians in the pockets.

Can we agree a national debate promoting a healthy lifestyle given the high incidence of NCDs is a good thing? The ‘proposed’ increase in the price of sweet drinks has triggered a national discussion, mission achieved. The blogmaster deliberately used the word proposed because a feature of the Mottley government has been to back out or delay a few decisions taken. Latest example is the postponement of breathalyzer testing because a metered taxi rate system needs to be implemented. You simply cannot make this stuff up.

There is voluminous information to support the conclusion sweet drinks have a high calorific content and therefore high consumption by individuals is likely to negatively impact ones health. The evidence is apparent that the current health trajectory Barbados is on must be interrupted. While we jabber away money must be found to pay for lifestyle choices made by Barbadians. If we want to drink sweet drinks and exhale smoke from our nostrils like Portvale factory, we must pay for it. A good government has to provide leadership that redounds to the benefit of the nation. There are numerous risk factors to manage as it relates to a healthy lifestylke, it is established sweet drinks contribute negatively to the risk factors associated with NCDs.

The blogmaster looks forward to those in the public and private sector charged with healthcare working together to implement effective measures to save Barbadians from themselves. 

See relevant link:

Sugary Drinks Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

Sugary Drinks

251 responses to “Sweet Drink Tizzy”

  1. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    i have pro-Black sites geared toward educating OUR PEOPLE because they are the ones who know very little to nothing about themselves…not saying that others will not be referenced because although we are the majority on the earth…..we don’t live on the earth by ourselves as some other groups pretend….but my sites have one agenda and from that there will be no deviation nor will anyone get any opportunity to sabotage to push their own agendas…

  2. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    William…in saying that, today am knocking back a chocolate mousse cake soaked in Amaretto…don’t even need to drink the brandy, life is good….and that’s how it should be FOR ALL BLACK/AFRIKAN PEOPLE…quality of life, and having financial and social choices…

  3. David Avatar
    David

    @Simple Simon

    The volunteer treasure is ‘ignorant’ with the mechanism to upload regularly via efiling?

  4. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    And just as i forgot to mention the NIS THEFTS in my comment…am sure none of them are giving pensioners and that of the disabled a second thought…. who are not receiving their payments as they should, if at all…money they paid into the fund…

    but the tens of millions stolen to build dead Cow’s fraudulent polo club, went up in smoke, especially when the new owners dug up the pool area….ya can’t hear a squeak about the people’s money lost in these SCAMS by the hundreds of millions to BILLIONS of dollars…

    4 seasons anyone? Northern always talks about that, but it’s not as important a topic as pushing a corrupt agenda of sleight of hand and false narratives….

  5. Dame+Bajans Avatar
    Dame+Bajans

    @John

    If you got a Barbadian ID, there was no need to register to vote. You are automatically added to the voters list. they used to be one and the same. That is how I got on the list of voters with the address where I was staying while on vacation. So when I vote in Bim, I have to vote in that district.

  6. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ Donna
    You are saying the same thing I am saying. @ David is going to persist with his belief that the political managerial class is getting away with murder because of a lack of activism on the part of the citizenry.
    That’s my view.
    Quite frankly you are one of the few on BU who do not give the political managerial class a pass. This is about the fourth time I have alluded to that.
    Peace.

  7. David Avatar
    David

    @Simple Simon

    You are over simplifying the point. It harken back to many discussions we have had in this space about the lack of awareness by ordinary citizens especially as it pertains to governance and civics matters. The blogmaster will agree that leadership in all spheres continue to faile us but the blogmaster will not allow a lazy in thought middleclass off the hook. A group that has failed to give us a reasonable rate of return on our investment in education through the years. This is the group that our leaders are born.

  8. David Avatar
    David

    @Simple Simon

    A look around Barbados there is definitely an uptick in visitors on island. The restaurants, hotels, rental cars are heavily booked.

    This isn’t the area of concern, it is the extent we are positioning to stabilize the economy with other pillars. It will take time given the late start but we must try harder.

  9. David Avatar
    David

    @Simple Simon

    How is your statement making sense if you consider the option the Bajan voter has is twiddle d or twiddle b? An intelligent people would infiltrate the two parties to force change or alternatively created attractive alternatives?

  10. David Avatar
    David

    @Donna

    The blogmaster wrote what he meant.

  11. David Avatar
    David

    @Simple Simon

    Many were standing in line because they are computer illiterate.

  12. David Avatar
    David

    @Dame Bajans

    You are added to the list but every citizen has a responsibility to inspect the list to ensure information is entered correctly. So there is an accountability factor to be honored.

  13. NorthernObserver Avatar
    NorthernObserver

    @SS
    I await the trials of Innes and Tasker……waiting in vain?
    My bet is somebody at H/O was ‘aware’, give it a pass…..until….the accounting group uncovered the mass of pottage….and then had to be seen as ‘complying’. The majority ICBL owner, was paying fines and disgorging profits, while certain people were still employed? In a typical world, they would long since be on administrative leave.

  14. David Avatar
    David

    @NO

    #disgorgement

  15. Cuhdear Bajan Avatar
    Cuhdear Bajan

    @David April 5, 2022 1:52 PM “You have to acknowledge that in order to be strident advocates and in the process hold elected officials accountable it requires an intelligent citizenry. There is no circumventing.”

    You still have not told us why you believe that Bajans are not intelligent citizens?

    Did not we ordinary Bajans raise the political class, the administrative class, the academic class, the business class [yes even the white men of the business class] Are they not ALL, including the PM just one or two generations removed from OUR working class homes? Did we not teach them ALL to read and write, did we not pay for their university educations [we coulda fete out we money ya know] dis we not burn the midnight oil with them while they studied? Did we not teach them how to be teachers, doctors, lawyers, engineers, [even politicians]

    So how come you feel [notice I did not say THINK] we stupid and they bright?

    The 30 people sitting in the house are no brighter than we are.

    The fellas sitting in the board rooms are not brighter than we are.

    Some [not all] may be greedier, some may be more unscrupulous. NOT a fella int brighter nor better.

    And when we ready we will send the bad behaved ones home. Just as we have long done.

  16. David Avatar
    David

    @Simple Simon

    The point is self explanatory if there is agreement that we are currently enduring a crisis of governance.

    #PAC
    #NIS
    #debt burden
    #trade deficit
    #etc

  17. de pedantic Dribbler Avatar
    de pedantic Dribbler

    @Skinner, you do prosecute the Blogmaster mercilessly (and questionably so, in my view) on this subject of leadership vrs citizen ‘apathy’. As @Donna noted, alas he does have the tendency to be cryptic in his posts and thus often has “stepped into it a little” with inexact commentary. That said, however, one must yet take the man at his words and actions across these pages over the years and NOT focus on an inexact post which is often just one of many across various blogs (and across various months of similarly themed topics). ….. His basic argument that “that in order to be strident advocates and in the process hold elected officials accountable it requires an intelligent citizenry” must be READ and understood as an _’ACTIVE, ENGAGED, INFORMED’ citizenry (as @Donna alluded to).

    That is a truism in EVERY nation for all citizens so it absolutely does not dismiss history nor make mutually exclusive your point that the type of Bajan from ’37, the Bobby Clarkes, those who railed against Sandi or any others are nowadays ‘foolish’ under the Blogmaster ‘Trident’…. That’s NOT his point and I think you really know that!

    I agree with the assessment that if we continue to facilitate our leaders’ behavior then regardless of the protests that will erupt from time to time that WE have abrogated our proper duties as guardians of OUR heritage (His not allowing the “lazy in thought middleclass off the hook”)

    The blogmaster admonished me (wrongly, let me add 🤣😎) for questioning as ‘fit for purpose’ the right of Russian or Chinese citizens to acclaim their leaders … so let me pose here the following contrived analogy from that… in our Bajan sphere who is it that’s fit for purpose: the political managing elite or the electoral class who accept their supposed wisdom and elect them regardless of the problems about which they (we) complain!

    Yes, yes, of course we are the same citizens who put boots on the ground to say ‘this can’t happen here’ often enough but we are also the same folks who heard one esteemed leader tell us that the courts will never give us the justice that we truly need … yet to this day some 40 plus year later we still continue to look for ‘salvation and justice’ and entrust our care into the hands of the same people who run those same courts and about whom we were told would NEVER give us justice!

    So please do tell me: who or which group are truly ‘fit for purpose’ !

    Governance and elections is a mutually inclusive damning mind game: we seek to elect the best from among us to protect and guide us from our worst impulses; although those who are motivated to be elected and thus present themselves as shining stars often are the greatest perpetrators of expressing those exact same bad impulses.

    It’s almost like a life of controlled delusionary antics .. with some protests and angry marches periodically done to remind those elected to temper their bad impulses … but invariably that’s just ‘fit for the particular purpose’!

    I gone.

  18. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ DPD
    I am here laughing. The Blogmaster has called me a RH and Jackass more than anybody else on this planet.
    He is free to continue calling me that. He is a defender of the political managerial class , more so Mottley and the BLP.
    He sometimes tries to emulate David Ellis by pretending he can make statements to draw others into his often puerile nonsense.
    He has no respect for the working class and very often protects the atrocities committed by the same political class he pretends to dislike.
    We agree on something’s but on this particular topic he is unapologetic and relentless. And that is his democratic right!
    As he recently reminded @ Donna, on this thread, he means what he said.
    He is on the wrong side of history.
    This is a democracy and I maybe a Jack ass and RH but like everybody else on BU , I call it as I see it.
    Those who are foolishly attempting to partner me with others, will fail. I am not a member of any tag team.
    I know the vast difference between prosecuting and opposing/critique.
    Nobody proscribes or prescribes what I write.,I give and take .
    No tag team here.
    Peace.

  19. David Avatar
    David

    @Dee Word

    The blogmaster cautions you to pontificate on your behalf. The blogmaster does not have to be prolix to make simple and obvious points. We cannot spend all day and night on a blog rebuking Barbadians for being docile in our system of governance and then give them a pass for being disengaged. This is after spending half billion annually on education for decades. The problem and solution will always be the ‘man in the mirror’.

  20. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    William….am waiting for them to not only mention but prosecute ALL THE MENTIONED CRIMINALITY….against the people…..then they can talk about which citizens don’t hold the corrupt responsible…they don’t even want to address any of what i outlined on both pageslet alone…..call out the same corrupt ministers, corrupt minorities, corrupt lawyers etc…but want the citizens…THE VICTIMS to do something about them…steuppsss..

    .then when they finally reach their limit of being discriminated against, oppressed, disenfranchised, robbed and treated like SLAVES and DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT….the same ones will call them crazy…like they call me..STEUPPSS and then will come the slander and sabotage….

    “He has no respect for the working class and very often protects the atrocities committed by the same political class he pretends to dislike.”

    while knowing fully well that the VICTIMS do not have what it takes to FIGHT BACK….they do not have my level of “crazy”

  21. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    So William…we fully expect Blogmaster and those who see the people as weak and too illiterate to understand their circumstances to show the oppressed masses how to fight back against their oppressors and those who discriminate against and rob them….going forward, that is what the blog should be dedicated to…..

    i would understand if the people are deemed UNDER-EDUCATED by design generationally, through no fault of their own……but you do not claim they are too stupid to help themselves without HELPING THEM TO FIGHT and better understand their predicament, with a view to helping them overcome their situation by presenting SOLUTIONS…

    after 16 years the blog should have developed a BLUEPRINT just for that….Black empowerment..

  22. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ WURA
    They simply cannot handle the truth. You have people working for $300 per week or less; spending 60% in bus fare; being daily ripped off by unscrupulous merchants/ retailers; exorbitant rents and they come here talking about applying pressure to them. We have poor black children that are eating the cheapest over priced junk and we come here talking about their parents need to buy healthy foods.? Buy fish and vegetables with what , sand?
    The damn truth is that poor children from our generation were eating far superior food and had a better quality of life than the poor of today.
    They don’t want to address anything but want everybody to come here and sing in some BLPDLP choir.
    Painting some pictures that only represent them and their comfort level.
    Poverty and extremely poor nutritional meals have been increasing from the early 80s
    We are told to accept a PM who criticize a fifteen persons cabinet but now has: a Chief of Staff; and three ministers/ semi ministers working in her office . Who is this Chief of Staff what is his or her purpose. She also has an information/ propagandists. In other words , the PM technically with all the advisers, ministers in her office , Chief of Staff etc has as many people working for her as the Stuart cabinet.
    What really is a senior minister?
    But these people come here telling their brothers and sisters who catching economic hell that they are to blame for not rising up against the political class.
    Pure nonsense.

  23. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    Besides, no Black conscious platform would dare push a colonial agenda …did they not go half a republic last year, and dropped/shed the monarchy?……complete with a nasty anti-black status quo..,,in 2022,…time for a long overdue UPGRADE..

    .and those who are saying how THINGS SHOULD …..are the ones responsible for leading the charge…

  24. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    and those who are saying how THINGS SHOULD BW//

    William……. i have always found the general pack mentality from Black people toward what other Black people in the DELIBERATELY depressed areas experience in Barbados to BE DAMN UNREASONABLE.

    ..they act like they are above it all, untouched from what others suffer….and it’s all the sufferers’ fault to hear them tell it….that is right up until IT’S THEIR TURN to feel it even more;…which is right around the corner..just in case they are still not getting it…

  25. de pedantic Dribbler Avatar
    de pedantic Dribbler

    @Skinner, the word prosecute does carry certain legal overtones but in my lexicon here there is absolutely no vast difference… it simply means to critique the matter relentlessly (or mercilessly as I noted). And surely no one would attempt to “proscribe or prescribe” what you write. I believe a little disagreement is good tonic for the soul!

    I certainly can’t agree with you that a guy who teamed up with others to create a medium such as this which enables so many to relentlessly ‘prosecute’, interrogate and examine the business of Bajan governance, lawyers in the news and so much that affects the fabric of this nation “has no respect for the working class“.

    That simply runs quite counter intuitively to the man’s stated mission. And the mere fact that these pages have exposed shenanigans across many an administration should give pause to the sentiment that he “often protects the atrocities committed by the same political class he pretends to dislike“.

    One can only to be fair and rational, good sir… we may absolutely not agree with positions he or his editorial acolytes take and he and they have cussed us all at one point or other (if you more than others than accept that badge of honor proudly 👍😎) but quite clearly they aggressively often take to task the political class even if at times they defend them when they do well. Nothing irrational or unreasonable about that.

    As he said above, “we cannot […] give [Bajans] a pass for being disengaged” as they can be at times. And it’s clear that the ongoing dynamic between citizens and the pols is fraught with complex decisions on how best to control our (worst) impulses and about electing those who are more like us that we would care to admit!

  26. Critical Analyzer Avatar
    Critical Analyzer

    The sweet drink tax is a tax grab and the usual government putting the horse before the cart yet again.

    They keep overstepping their authority which is to define and inform the population what the standards in Barbados are and put things in place to help us easily identify which standards the products and services being offered meet so we can make informed decisions.

    A simple rating system based on sugar content by volume or weight is the simple way to go. The rating can be no sugar, low sugar, medium sugar or high sugar content and shops can be required to have the rating displayed on the product’s price label, shelf price label or placed in an entire section with products of the same rating.

  27. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ DPD
    I have credited those who own or control this blog for the opportunity. I am putting it directly to you that @ David is constantly blaming citizens for not being engaged. Like you, I asked him what keeps BU going : Is it not “ engaged” citizens?
    I am here dealing with one issue: his determined nonsense about people being uneducated and the negative branding he puts on ordinary citizens.
    He has honestly told you and others who have rushed to his defense that he does not need it. But yet you and they persist.
    The boss cow is give a good bucket of milk and then knock it down.
    Nothing wrong with you and others giving him a pass but on this particular issue he does not get one from me , and I am certain , it matters not to him.
    He knows what he writes and I know what I write. Like you said there is nothing wrong with robust debate. He and I have been here before.
    The only blog , that I am involved with , m sure that Barbados Underground is followed. We promote this blog almost on a daily basis.
    Peace

  28. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ WURA
    It’s a facade. A kind of social /,intellectual arrogance. Nobody can tell them anything but they assign divine rights to themselves to direct how others think and write.
    Disagree with them and they assign you to a box. It’s so funny. Good sport.
    Peace.

  29. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    “I am here dealing with one issue: his determined nonsense about people being uneducated and the negative branding he puts on ordinary citizens.”

    the people are NOT uneducated…..THEY ARE UNDER-EDUCATED….= they are missing crucial information that would allow them to PROGRESS and REACH THEIR FULL POTENTIAL………huge difference……they did not bring that on themselves, it’s a lasting derivative of the repulsive colonial post-emancipation BLIGHT…

    ….it’s a colonial construct forced on 2 generations STILL, and the last half century KEPT IN PLACE by the traitors in the parliament…..without any upgrades that would allow the people to resist their oppression.

    ..but that was the whole point, keep them docile and do whatever they want to them…..without any fight back…keep them in poverty and in financial dire straits….then threaten them with legal regimes….legislations, slave laws and slave codes…..kept in place for exactly that purpose…if they try to resist or make their voice heard….hence the Public Order Act is still in place..

    …these are the things BU should be ADVOCATING TO HAVE REMOVED…i have spoken about this thousands of times on BU and everyone just pretended that i didn’t..

    .but don’t tell the people they are stupid because you want to see them forever trapped in a colonial construct to feed bottomfeeders……this is the time to put an end to all of that..

  30. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    “Nobody can tell them anything but they assign divine rights to themselves to direct how others think and write.”

    they should have figured out after 10 years that i don’t play those games, you cannot have it both ways, you are either using the platform to better your people’s existence, make the necessary changes, or to keep the same decrepit status quo in place to help destroy them….it’s a no-brainer…

    bonne nuit.

  31. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ WURA
    I don’t know who they think built this country and still paying every frigging sacrifice for them to run their mouths with pseudo intellectual crap.
    It’s so disrespectful to sit in their ivory towers and pour scorn on the poor black masses
    Where is the sensitivity the love for their people.
    Imagine, they could have used the same tourist industry to empower their own but they did not. Now, that the industry struggling they talking about community tourism when they for the last forty years trying to keep the tourists from the community.
    They are frauds.
    They going to help poor black youth with $5000 loans but they tried to get with Mark Maloney to make millions of the vaccines.
    These criminals are watching all the black manufactures disappear but find $ 300 million to give hoteliers while the same hotel workers begging for monies owed to them.
    Frauds.
    You sit in parliament for donkey years, never saw the necessity for eighteen years old in parliament but suddenly one comes along who supports you and you are prepared to change the constitution for him to b we in the senate.
    Frauds.
    More to come
    Peace

  32. de pedantic Dribbler Avatar
    de pedantic Dribbler

    @Skinner, fair enough re “I am here dealing with one issue: his determined nonsense about people being uneducated and the negative branding he puts on ordinary citizens.” …. But let’s be clear : I am NOT rushing to defend him on ANYTHING. Nor am I interested in his perplexing and confusingly weird remarks about “caution” above. And fah sure, it would be foolish of me to perceive that I need to defend a man of his capacity and intellect.

    His remarks about Bajans being “uneducated” must also be interpreted in the context of his oft repeated remarks about the expenditures on education here on the rock. I read the comments as being facetious, sarcastic and intended to incite a reflection on the lack of emphasis placed on studies in technical areas as compared to things like legal education. In that sense his ripostes are NOT ill-formed. … So this is surely not about giving him a pass. …. I simply am in agreement with his broad thesis re citizen ‘disengagement’.

    Clearly, IMHO it’s ‘ridiculous’ to perceive that Bajans have not been well educated, are not well informed or even that we are under-educated based on the sizable cohorts of PhDs and MScs and others with first degrees, associate degrees, City & Guilds and multiple professional accreditations like CMA, ACA and MBAs, Fellows etc which abound … not to mention the strong awareness for over 40 years now by the regular non-lettered Bajan of the issues raised by people like John King (‘How Many More Must Die’), Gabby (‘Boots’ and endless), RPB (take your pick), people like Eric Sealy and Elombe, the same Bobby Clarke and all your comrades of yesteryear and folks like the ‘Cement Man’ and the many others of today.

    We simply CANNOT be ‘ignorant’ of the knowledge of what bedevils us … and no one can rationally accuse us of that … we just seem to be freaking indifferent on some of the issues!

    So I really do believe that it’s incomprehensible to interpret his sentiments in a ‘narrow’ construct of disrespect when he berates Bajan ‘apathy’ at times. Just saying!

  33. Artax Avatar
    Artax

    Mr. Skinner made some very interesting comments in his April 5, 2022 8:14 PM contribution, especially those related to the tourism industry.

    I’ve been hearing about ‘community tourism’ from the time I was at secondary school in the early 1980s.
    But, I remember, during those years, when hotel security guards were running the black coral and beach craft vendors from off the beaches. They were deemed to be either ‘beach bums’ or ‘drug pushers.’

    The hotel operators were allowed to encourage tourists not to mingle with hotel employees or in the surrounding communities with ordinary Barbadians.
    They also constructed kiosks on their premises to facilitate the sale of beach towels, souvenirs and locally made ‘tied dyed’ and other clothing…… as well as to accommodate hair dressing salons for guests who wanted their hair ‘braided with beads,’ and invested in beach chairs……. which only served as a means of systematically removing Vendors from the beaches, thereby depriving them from ‘making a living as a result.

    Why is it that, with a Hotel School and UWI offering BSc and MSc degree programmes such as International Tourism Management, Tourism Development & Management, Culinary Arts etc, we remain unable to recruit suitable candidates from Barbados or the region, to fill management positions at local hotels?

    How could tourism officials, in all seriousness, talk about ‘community tourism,’ when hotel operators have been making the Bajan custom of ‘going to the sea’ increasingly difficult, by blocking access to the beach from Bajans in surrounding and other communities?

    Guests are also encouraged, by Concierge and Front Desk, to hire vehicles from the large rental companies such as, Courtesy Car Rentals, Stoute’s Car Rentals and Drive-A-Matic.

    These are the types of issues I want to hear Chief Executive Officer of the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association, Rudy Grant; Minister of Tourism, Lisa Cummins and other ‘top level hotel players’ discuss.

    However, ‘on a positive note,’ fortunately, at least two vendors I know that operate bars on Dover Beach, told me sales for vendors operating there were extremely high, especially after cricket, when the British were here for the recent test match.

  34. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    “@ WURA
    I don’t know who they think built this country and still paying every frigging sacrifice for them to run their mouths with pseudo intellectual crap.
    It’s so disrespectful to sit in their ivory towers and pour scorn on the poor black masses”

    i remember very well when my sites launched, BUs little imps and pimps made it their personal business to start launching personal attacks for months and months, mind you, i never tief anything from them, my sites, books and magazine are funded by ME, and geared as designed toward black improvement, empowerment, upliftment and education about our ancestors, and the half that HAS NEVER BEEN TOLD….anyone who has visited the sites can tell you, even though one has still not been upgraded to specs yet, that’s why they continue visiting BOTH…it’s because of the information available and WHAT they can learn…

    ….but this anti-black movement immediately started ON BU to attempt to SABOTAGE me from educating the masses about what is hidden from them….all because they don’t like how i write or express myself and they DO NOT WANT to hear OR LEARN anything outside of what they are indoctrinated to believe, no matter HOW it’s presented..and in true slaveminded style, they are well aware that is what their pretend slave masters want…and what corrupt politicians want continued indefintely, no changes to their dirty little plans to never upgrade to Black enfranchisement….otherwise, there is NO WAY, even if you don’t care for a person, you would attempt to stop them from distilling information that would be helpful TO YOUR PEOPLE….

    so it has become clear, that BUs only reason for existence, outside of the colonial political claptrap always spewed, because that is what it will always be until the appropriate changes are made……. is.to maintain the anti-black status quo, instead of drafting a plan to LEAD THE PEOPLE OUT OF OPPRESSION AND BONDAGE…the blog showed itself to be pro colonial construct to keep Black people TRAPPED INDEFINITELY….and the blogmaster cannot deny it, simply because……..(will leave that one right there)..

    .am not saying that was the initial plans, the blog may have started with the best of intentions but got lost somewhere along the way……giving the benefit of the doubt…but it could all have been designed specifically to continue the minorities on top and Blacks at the bottom of the financial and social ladder,,,which it had become glaring that there has been very little attempt to change the pecking order…

    “I simply am in agreement with his broad thesis re citizen ‘disengagement’.”

    but one must be fair….the people were SOCIALIZED by the same disgusting politicians for over half century GENERATIONALLY …to leave everything to us, we will take care of it all, you don’t have to do nothing, just vote every five years, which then evolved to ///it’s none of wunna business, we know what we are doing, you did not go to university, we are lawyers and got degrees….which then revoluted to…..wunna slaveminded and cahn pronounce words….so BU is showing in your face blatant disdain,black snobbishness and HYPOCRISY……against the Black majority who are the ones feeling the brunt of political corruption and government treachery…..

    i practically EXHAUSTED MYSELF on BU outlining how crossections of the Afrikan descended population is MALICOUSLY disenfranchised and ROBBED generationally, and that NEVER ONCE made any profound impact on the blogmaster and many on here…not enough to say or do anything about it…..while knowing that it will NEVER END if not dismantled..that too caused me to make the decision to get my own platforms to distill what i know would make a difference and it has…and keep it out of the way of those who would sabotage it to push pro white racist agendas…

  35. 555dubstreet Avatar
    555dubstreet

    ” African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved April 6,

    “@ WURA”

    you seem to keep reasoning surreal and not real and about your persona

    your pyschommetric analysis reveals you’re not
    (a) black (b) female
    but are actually
    (c) white (c) male
    in disguise
    something is not right
    you are busted
    and we are disgusted

  36. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    ya still have to prove all of ya delusions…..prove it…

    i notice none of you are ever able to prove anything …but go on and on anyway…and still cannot STOP ANYTHING…..BUs loser brigade…

  37. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    btw…why don’t you tell BU what is happening in Jamaica…you use their culture and music to post crap all day long like you know something about what these people are experiencing, like you got some right and authority……Jamaicans are speaking out….post to the blog what you know…like i can..

    and stop using Caribbean people for your repulsive agendas, you do not know what or how we think or feel and NEVER WILL..

    https://www.instagram.com/tv/Cb-tFMYpLo0/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

  38. 555dubstreet Avatar
    555dubstreet

    I was going to post this video for GP although it can apply to Wuraola too

    the meditation question for the universe is

    Who is the best teacher on Bu?

    Join us for this powerful Kundalini Yoga Meditation to Bless Yourself using the Mantra “Ong Namo Guru Dev Namo” ( I bow to the subtle Divine teacher within). “It is the first human right and duty to bless the Self and to bless all.” Yogi Bhajan.

  39. William Skinner Avatar
    William Skinner

    @ Artax
    It went a lot further. The hoteliers and governments ran the vendors of the beach because they knew that the vendors were making collectively , millions of dollars. They knew that a hard working vendor could easily make $1000 USD per week. I know vendors who when the industry was booming , made five times that.
    They also knew that tourists arrivde at the hotels and the very first thing they ask about is the availability of drugs. Every single tourist destination has gigolos. The problem with the white hoteliers was they did not mind the white gigolos coming on their properties with white tourist women, but they had a problem with black gigolos.
    The hoteliers started to open souvenir shops on their premises and sold the same products that the guys were selling on the beach and they bad talked the beach vendors by telling the guests to stay away from the locals on the beach. Every single small black business in the industry was sabotaged and or destroyed by local white racists and white expatriates assisted by shameless backward black governments.
    There was a whole lot of economic racism that the black political managerial class refused to challenge.
    Look around the industry today. Look at who owns the car rental business; the small apartment/hotels properties and we will see who was looked after and who cashed in on the industry.
    They now come talking about community tourism. Big Joke !!. The small businesses like Boyce’s shop at the bottom of St. Lawrence gap were community tourism; taxi men taking tourists to their homes to enjoy our culture was community tourism; the return visitors came every year because of the small friendly community they built up with ordinary Bajans.
    In the meantime, the big white owned tour companies ripped off the tourist carry them around the island at brek neck speed. I know of what I speak. I had interest in a small tour company. Many tourists tried our product and those who had also tried the big ones, told us that we took time; explained historic areas; gave them all the time they needed to take pictures and then took them to a establishment down Bathsheba and gave them an inclusive meal not one transported in the tour bus that was crude and which they were forced to eat in record speed. On our return they paid us way above what we charged because of the service provided.
    I would not even worry to comment about the racial profiling at the Carlisle club on Bay street and others.
    The Minister does not even know what community tourism means or what it is. In the words of a popular calypso: She betta ask somebody. She is a fashionista that’s all.

  40. David Avatar
    David

    Less is more.

  41. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    Am sorry, but never set out to be a BU teacher, that is and will NEVER be my intent…you have the wrong person…

    …my purpose is to SHARE INFORMATION not known before to benefit the people who are ROBBED of the ability to understand what was created to UNDERMINE and keep them trapped intellectually, socially, and FINANCIALLY…..that’s all.

    ..this is not a competition, never was for me, never carried an 11 plus primary school mindset where i have to compete against every post/comment and never will..

  42. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    “The problem with the white hoteliers was they did not mind the white gigolos coming on their properties with white tourist women, but they had a problem with black gigolos.”

    every hotel has white/minority drug dealers….no need to draw a picture there either..

  43. 555dubstreet Avatar
    555dubstreet

    “Am sorry, but never set out to be a BU teacher, that is
    and will NEVER be my intent…you have the wrong person…”
    “…uosɹǝd ƃuoɹʍ ǝɥʇ ǝʌɐɥ noʎ…ʇuǝʇuᴉ ʎɯ ǝq ɹƎΛƎN llᴉʍ puɐ
    sᴉ ʇɐɥʇ ‘ɹǝɥɔɐǝʇ ∩q ɐ ǝq oʇ ʇno ʇǝs ɹǝʌǝu ʇnq ‘ʎɹɹos ɯ∀”

    you didn’t answer the question
    and should give it reflection
    if the answer is Wuraola
    what was the question?

  44. 555dubstreet Avatar
    555dubstreet

    Learn to pronounce antithesis

    a person or thing that is the direct opposite of someone or something else.
'love is the antithesis of selfishness'
synonyms: (direct) opposite, converse, reverse, reversal, inverse, obverse, the other extreme, the other side of the coin, the flip side
(in Hegelian philosophy) the negation of the thesis as the second stage in the process of dialectical reasoning.
  45. 555dubstreet Avatar
    555dubstreet

    If you want to be a good teacher
    you must be sweet like sugar
    and not the apotheosis of polrumptious* and obstropolous**
    (*/**) describing someone who’s grumpy, argumentative, and totally convinced that they’re right.

  46. African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved Avatar
    African Online Publishing Copyright ⓒ 2022. All Rights Reserved

    tell that to those on BU to teach….again……SHARING INFORMATION IS THE ONLY GOAL…and does not require any of your load of crap…

    and looking to make friends and grow followers is not part of the agenda…, it’s straight forward, cut and dried…who understands that will, who don’t, tough….and proves my point about the inability to understand BASIC ENGLISH…

  47. David Avatar
    David

    Apply sweet tax in tiers, says manufacturer – Apply sweet tax in tiers, says manufacturer:

    https://barbadostoday.bb/2022/04/07/apply-sweet-tax-in-tiers-says-manufacturer/

  48. David Avatar
    David

    Today’s Nation Editorial


    Eat healthier at lower cost
    This society is in the midst of severe challenges. Efforts to contain the cost of living have been handed a severe blow by the war in Ukraine.
    Most of the focus on that war rests on the global human rights aspects of the conflict and on the manner of its execution; and also on the “warring” parties directly involved.
    But there is also a two-edged and devastating blow to the cost of local consumer items caused by the anticipated scarcity of supply, as well as the knock-on effect of increased transportation costs.
    Following upon the adverse economic impact of COVID-19 on the costs of basic food, it has become clear that Barbadian households will have to be much more careful about their spending habits.
    Every single penny must count. The old-fashioned approach of cutting and contriving has to return to the front burner. We are not suggesting a wholesale adoption of former Prime Minister Owen Arthur’s advice that we should get back to the kitchen garden.
    Yet a change in our buying and eating habits is necessary. Some of the most traditional foods cost much less than the fashionable but newer fare.
    An obvious benefit to our country is that, as the medical experts tell us, the fibre content of the complex carbohydrates of traditional foods will almost certainly provide a healthier, higher and better quality life for those sensible enough to choose this traditional approach to making and consuming food.
    Some return to traditional choices would signal a renewed national attack on the non-communicable diseases so widespread in this country.
    It is the least we can do to encourage Barbadians
    to return to and consider some of the old ways of doing things in the kitchen garden and thereafter in the kitchen. Thus, we might “kill two birds with one stone”.
    Avoid medical expenses
    We can eat healthier while enjoying the immediate lower financial outlay. We can also avoid future medical costs associated with the dreaded lifestyle diseases that come from unhealthy eating and exercise habits.
    Given current energy challenges, it would also be in the national interest to tap into the renewable energy market.
    Circumstances alter cases.
    The traditional way of warming water used by some in earlier days is a reminder of how the sun can be adapted in a modern manner to assist in the cost of otherwise providing electricity by the use of fossil fuels.
    The grim reality is that the war may continue for some time and that even if it ends almost immediately, there will be some inevitable lead time before a return to normality from the combined deleterious impact of the COVID-19 experience and the Ukraine war.
    We urge our people to brace themselves, as Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley says, for some discomfort. There is not much we can do to cause and ensure a cessation of the hostilities.
    On the other hand, as individuals, we can effectively support the national objective of aiming for food security and also protect our national health and the economics of health care.
    A concerted return to the better aspects of our traditional ways of backyard gardening and nutrition and cultural ways of doing some things can re-equip us with keys to a much healthier and less expensive quality of life.

  49. GP Avatar
    GP

    re SHARING INFORMATION IS THE ONLY GOAL
    really? it is about SHARING the CORRECT PERTINENT PRACTICAL INFORMATION PERRENNIALLY

    WE HAVE NOT DONE THIS HERE OR ON THE ISLAND FOR THIS ISSSUE NOR HAVE WE DONE IT FOR COVID 19, BUT WE HAVE CHATTERED AT LENGTH AND WE HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO LEARN FROM GOOD SOLID ADVICE

    O TE MISERUM

  50. Miller Avatar
    Miller

    (Quote):
    April 8, 2022 5:47 AM
    Every single penny must count. The old-fashioned approach of cutting and contriving has to return to the front burner. We are not suggesting a wholesale adoption of former Prime Minister Owen Arthur’s advice that we should get back to the kitchen garden.
    Yet a change in our buying and eating habits is necessary. Some of the most traditional foods cost much less than the fashionable but newer fare.
    An obvious benefit to our country is that, as the medical experts tell us, the fibre content of the complex carbohydrates of traditional foods will almost certainly provide a healthier, higher and better quality life for those sensible enough to choose this traditional approach to making and consuming food.
    (Unquote).
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    @ David [BU]:

    It seems your mainstream media ‘colleagues/competitors are slowly coming around to the idea of imposing a FAT TAX (which, euphemistically speaking, can be labelled the NCD Levy) on Fast Food (aka slow poisoning) outlets whose annual sales exceeds the VAT registration threshold.

    Maybe a bigger push of this idea from yourself and the likes of Kammie Holder could see the imposition of such a levy in the same manner that the recent increase in the “Sweet Drink” levy is expected to realize a reduction in diabetes among Bajans.

    Basing the argument on ‘the polluter pays principle, why not frontload the ‘known’ future costs of care for those stricken with the NCDs the same way the users of alcohol and tobacco are burdened with taxation?

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