The answer to this question might seem clear to most people following the news, calling in to the talk shows or discussing current events at the dinner table. For them the answer is that crime is out of control, jobs are scarce, income is stagnant, businesses are struggling, cost of living is rising, too many things seem to be either not working or stalled. Generally, they feel that we are in a circumstance of economic littleness, social yuckiness and political sourness.

On the surface, there is some truth to this but on a deeper level, our circumstances are more profound. More deeply, our circumstances are about what is happening in us rather than what is happening to us. Crime is happening to us but a willingness to "cast off restraint", as the Good Book puts it, is happening in too many of us, particularly our young, black males who live in urban Nassau or, to a lesser degree, Freeport.

Unemployment is happening to some 15 percent to 20 percent of us but more deeply, poor financial intelligence, limited employability and business frustration is happening in many of us. Political missteps may be happening in front of us but political mistrust is happening in us. Social disorder is what we see around us but incoherence and disunity is what is happening in us.

"More deeply, our circumstances are about what is happening in us rather than what is happening to us." It is what is happening within us that is shaping what is happening around us and to us. Within us there is anxiety about our uncertain short and medium-term economic future; fear about our safety in the face or increasing numbers of young men without regard for life, limb or labour; deep uneasiness with the long term implications of illegal immigration and legal foreign participation in our economy and social system; disenchantment with the seeming ineffectiveness of the political leadership on all sides of the divide; and frustration with the mediocrity that seems to characterize life, business and service in our country. There is more happening within us but these are enough to make the point.

A reasonable objector would say that this doom and gloom is but only a partial picture of what is happening in our nation. They would say there are good things happening to and in The Bahamas. I agree absolutely!

We Bahamians love this country. We yearn for its better. We see within us the potential to be more than we are. We love our beaches, our God, our Junkanoo and our conch. None of us believes that our country is all bad.

The problem is that the things that are wrong in The Bahamas - crime, joblessness, rising cost of living with stagnant income, etc. are like having a badly broken toe, the excruciating pain of it makes the whole body sick, even the healthy parts. Perhaps worse than a broken toe, it is like having a broken heart, one made sick by hope deferred, to borrow sentiments from the Bible.

What we need, what we long for is healing of our broken toe, of our broken heart. Until that happens happiness, comfort and satisfaction remain elusive. This is the challenge of the leadership of our nation going forward, to produce that healing, to advance that better and to bring that comfort. To do this, that leadership will need to have a set of skills equal to the challenge. What are those skills? We will look at that soon.

o Zhivargo Laing is a Bahamian economic consultant and former Cabinet minister who represented the Marco City constituency in the House of Assembly.

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