As Cuba becomes increasingly open to American tourists, The Bahamas throws its self further into the pocket of foreign direct investment. It would seem that Cuba embraces its culture, its history and its geography. Meanwhile, the Bahamas rejects its very being. Yet we have become a place where government boasts about being the most progressive government in the history of the country, or was it since independence?
Local 10 in Miami follows the opening of Cuba closely because they know that many will venture to that country's shores. The old money that left in the 1950s and 1960s is eager to reestablish a presence in their old country. But things have changed since a tiny oligarchy of mostly Spanish-descended landowners and some multinational American corporations owned the great majority of the land and production. The country clubs are now nationalized and serve as art schools universities and centers for development of the nation and its people, because Cuba realizes the massive importance of its human capital.
Our neighbor just a few minutes to the south has cottoned onto the benefit of educating the masses, empowering the locals and creating a place that is open to investors but is never owned by them, because the patrimony cannot be foreign owned, it is Cuban. This is a win-win situation. All the while, people here complain about not having access to the consumerist north, in Cuba though, they buy and sell as they choose with government controls.
While Cuba controls or manages its development, The Bahamas has simply thrown everything to the wind, not just caution, and gone for broke. We will sell our first and last born if we think it will help us to service our debt today, the heck with tomorrow. Moreover, we teach our people that they are worth less than foreign money. They will be discouraged at all turns, unless they are from a particular group who can read beyond high school level and think themselves out of the box they were sewn into. Their education does not enable them to do this.
If 50 percent of the population does not finish high school with a national diploma, cannot read, cannot write and cannot count, where does that leave a country that surrenders all to the almighty dollar? In the last few months, the government has won the hearts and minds of the same people who cannot think themselves out of the box of mental slavery, by telling us that we will get free health national healthcare. The details have been quietly secreted from us.
Is it really only a $250 annual treatment allowance per person? Little will that matter because the word free sounds good and ain't no body checking for the details. The government going to say many things, but the fishmonger, as we always say, will never say his fish stink. He will tell you the other man fish stink, when he knows his own fish has been on ice for longer than we have been breathing as a 'free' country.
And that freedom is intricately tied to the debt that we are now living off. The progressive government has sold us a dream that is really a nightmare, only the people who are their fan base cannot stop for long enough to see it.
As the jobs that once accompanied a dysfunctional national electricity corporation disappear into the hands of a foreign-owned, foreign-controlled and obviously mostly foreign-run power company, gone will be their fan bases' ability to survive, but as long as they get free healthcare and a few drinks, they good.
No one knew that legislation was passed enabling the selling of a national corporation and its renaming in record time - while the Ministry of Miseducation continued to espouse those old colonial truths that black hair is unkept unless processed into acceptability - except those in the proverbial know. Government shall not be shackled by the law! But we need not worry about legality or the law because we have been warned by the courts that it is not their fault that criminals are loose and murders are granted bail and continue to murder while out on bail.
In fact, they will kill, intimidate and/or maim any witness that they know of, so that if their trial ever does happen, there will be no one to testify. Case thrown out, thank you very much. But how dare we criticize the court and its right to grant bail. It often sounds like the same dog that don't bark at parked car, snarling and baring its fangs at us if we dare to question. Such is the progressive state of governance. Has it ever changed?
As Cuba opens up and hosts the truly progressive Pope twice in less than a year, this last time to chat with the leader of the Eastern Orthodox Church to see how they can possibly bridge an old gap, our government uses discourse of you are either white me or you with him, and, if you with him, you lose. This does not a nation build. There is an appearance of freedom of information, but what we know is actually carefully controlled and certainly engineered for enhancement.
Meanwhile, we lose more jobs each time a foreign company arrives and takes the place of a national company. It is not that we cannot do it; the reality is, in fact, that we have not been allowed to do it.
When we had The Government High School, it produced some of the greatest thinkers in the nation; they then challenged the status quo. We learnt from our mistakes. Government High quickly became an all-access school to reduce the inequalities in the nation. Only, the inequalities have grown and the poverty with them.
So, what did the 'nationalization' of The Government High School truly do? Create a system where children in a black country are told that they as blacks are dumb and stupid and will never amount to anything other than being menial workers on the new plantation, and then they are told that their skin color is wrong and, "god, please do not let me see you come to school with your hair looking like that. I will send you home until you learn how to hide that hair under some weave, perm or wigs.
Locks are of the devil, yet perm is good, but I am not preaching self-hatred, I am only trying to make you understand how you will get ahead in life. We certainly don't want a bunch of dark black people in our schools, so please bleach and lighten up the place. It may kill you, but at least you'll look presentable".
We cannot blame government nor the Ministry of Miseducation that puts hundreds of millions of dollars annually into failing students and producing more who cannot read. We must blame the people who obviously do not understand the incredible job the once laudable now mostly laughable service is doing to put our country on the world map.
We have reached a juncture in our history where we must be proud of our national achievement level where the E average is commendable because it is in the middle of the line between A and U, perhaps. We would rather beat our students into submission than really teach them to think and create for themselves. The big question in class nowadays is, "What would you like me to say?" And this usually comes the day before the assignment is due.
We have arrived at first world status, where the fans will be promoted to clerks in the public service the day before those jobs are absorbed into a privatization, foreign direct investment purchase agreement that moves the power off shore while divesting the nation of even more of its land. We have changed our economic development model so much that it still seems identical to that which was created by the leader of the country more than 50 years ago. Progress is real.
When black children are suspended because of their natural hair and the natural beauty of their skin, and their brain is bleached away we have obviously arrived. We must unencumber our minds of the thought that progressive means the ability to empower the population through ownership, attainable through education, engagement and hard work and a knowledge of the Bahamian history of slavery, colonialism and disempowerment that came along with those, and taught the people that they were not good enough, not the Boston Tea Party, though this can come later.
When young people can say they thought Over-the-Hill was a figure of speech, we know that we have missed something somewhere. Cuba is opening to the U.S., and it has an educated population that is proud to be Cuban and, even when black, is proud to be black, not denied access to education because of their natural hair showing too boldly. They can speak circles around Bahamian tourism workers, who are only there to pay for their weave.
Cuban hospitality workers are well-educated and proud; they may wear weave, but they know themselves and celebrate who they are. What are we doing as we sell off the very anchors of our nation to the international barges of progress, that, like most ships, pass quietly in the night but not before enriching themselves through our foibles? We are truly a progressive state! It is a shame that we don't understand that the meaning has changed. Progressive now means we inhabit a black country where blackness is unacceptable and progress is a nightmare dressed like a daydream.
o Ian Bethell-Bennett is a lecturer at The College of The Bahamas.
Click here to read more at The Nassau Guardian
