Let's sign an evacuation order for this guy and evacuate him to Ragged Island, where communication is scarce.

ROTFL

Even Zhivago Laing, in his arrogance, knows everyone is watching the BREXIT to see what happens with that and what happens to Britain after it leaves the EU. Will it become another Haiti. Will it be shunned and scorned by the rest of Europe and even the United States and Canada? There is no need to rush into an organization where the exits may be blocked or too narrow to exit in the same condition and independence you entered into it. Everyone is trying to strengthen their boarders not weaken them, even with trade. Carey Leonard needs to take a chill pill and relax.

Carey Leonard is somehow on Red China's 'payroll' for him to be constantly talking all of this foolishness.....he's the type of lawyer who would value dollars stuffed in his pockets by Red China more than his loyalty and patriotism as a Bahamian to the Bahamas and his looking out for the interests of his fellow Bahamians.

Joining the WTO would put the Bahamas right where Red China wants us to be put - fully under their control with zero benefits for the Bahamian people as is usually the case for smaller nations conned into joining the WTO to do Red China's bidding.

Why doesn't Carey Leonard just come right out and tell us how many of his clients are connected in someway to Red China? I will tell you why - He's nothing but a handsomely paid and seriously conflicted mouth piece for Red China.

This fool is only thinking about lining his pockets not the 1,000's of Bahamians (myself included) that will lose their jobs when the employment market is flooded with cheap labour.

Bahamians are tired of listening to Lawyers you all change into LIARS way to easy.....

WTO does not mean free movement of people. If it did then the US would not be able to say no to other WTO members citizens coming in (Haiti, Mexico and pretty much everywhere else except here).

WTO does NOT mean free movement of labour, true..**BUT** what they consistently fail to mention are that OTHER "reforms" they have already passed and will continue to pass to neatly take care of that. They've already put into place a policy that allows ANY Indian national with a US, British or Canadian visa to enter the Bahamas for work without a work permit. Now their argument will be well we need those guys for the high tech jobs...nevermind that they spoke about creating high tech jobs for Bahamians and who's to stop the Indian maid with a Canadian visa from coming as well?

The half isn't being told

Well USA has its own rules. So under this globalist setup the Bahamas would be inundated with cheap labour from Asia. This would have you begging for Haitians?

These deals decimated trades such as dress makers, and tailors in Jamaica. It raised the import bill for cheap food imports and almost wiped out farmers. And if it were not for stiff resistance they would have flooded the place with Hotel workers from the DR etc.

These things are bad for small economies.

Thanks for these points. All true.

Leonard also said he does not understand Super Value owner, Rupert Roberts’s objection to WTO: “I haven’t got a clue where Rupert Roberts is coming (from). I don’t understand why he is objecting to it. I don’t see a downside,” he said.

It's because you are a liar lying about your reasons .... just come out and say you want more easy money all lawyers do..... Mr. Roberts clearly stated his reasons in the papers on numerous occasions. In fact i think Bahamas Press and the Punch carried it also because it spoke to so many hard working Bahamians....

Bey you think no one realizes you are the mouth piece for Fred Mitchell when he's gone?? You like the gubmint people dem tink we stupid??

The honest truth is this country is in "free fall." From the loss of offshore financial services due to OECD blacklisting, which demolished our international banking prestige to the recent Hurricane Dorian, which wiped out our high rollers' yaucht haven in Abaco. We have lost a huge amount of reputational capital in a very short time. There is no doubt that something must be done to deliver The Bahamas from sinking into failure. What that something is, I do not know. Would the WTO help? Anything is worth a shot. We are looking at failed state status folks. This hurricane did far more damage to The Bahamas' fiscal sustainability than we even realize at this time. The Image of the Bahamas has changed in the international imagination from paradise to horror show. The status quo is no longer acceptable, or we are headed to downgrade after downgrade, recession after recession.

hey

WTO will **never** be worth a shot, under any circumstance.

Carey,
I wonder what planet you are living on?
The Bahamas could simply do better in everything they do, and then people would be beating at our door for what we offer. Isn't that how you were raised? Financial services? Can you honestly, from your ivory tower, not see what financial services has done to this world. Financial services produce NOTHING of value for humanity. Except a fat paycheck for lawyers, and other paper shufflers, who also honestly produce little of value to humanity. Harsh, but true. Quit looking for the easy fix. Until we improve our job skills, our educational system, our productivity, and perhaps if we were a bit more honest in this country, we would go somewhere. WTO will not help improve any of these standards. We must do it ourselves.

You hit the nail on the head!!!

The question is: will we ever do it ourselves? What if another CAT 5 hurricane hits New Providence next year? I have been the biggest critic of WTO. I believe we must get our house in order first. But what if we never get our house in order? The Bahamas needs a new leverage strategy moving forward. Abaco was a yachters' paradise, and Baker's Bay was creaming it. Then, hurricane Dorian hit and all of that is gone. Where do we turn from here? If only Minnis would pass the Freedom of Information Act and campaign finance reform, which he for some reason refuses to do, I would be willing to give WTO a chance. WTO is not terrible, if you have the right expertise and you negotiate awesome accession terms. I do not have faith in the negotiation skills of The Bahamas' negotiation team, but if I did, then I would definitely be interested in considering WTO. No more propoganda please: both the pros and cons would need to be freely discussed and a comparitive study on its impact on other undeveloped, small economies. The Bahamas needs something big!!! It has too much debt to do nothing, or it will default on its loans. If we had no debt, as in our nation's past, hurricanes posed little problem, and we relied on our British compatriots. Now we are 8 billion in debt and an independent country, we must do something to energize our economy.

You obviously believe you will somehow benefit from the Bahamas joining the WTO whereas the vast majority of Bahamians know they would be on the losing end in a very big way.

So how would you suggest The Bahamas deal with its cratering economy due to Hurricane Dorian and future global warming threat? Honestly, I respect your opinion greatly.

Anything to do with WTO leads to breaking emerging countries industries. It demands small countries removing tarrifs that protect local industries. So it messes up the honey man, the furniture man, the company that makes beer, juice etc.

Then there is Amnesty. Whenever you see Amnesty you see LGBT right behind it. Look around your country, you will see these NGO run by pseudo intellectual locals. Funded by European Human rights. Which is why Police must do right. They will start pointing the flaws of Police, they beat this one, shoot this one, harass this one, crime will spiral, because the Police will be afraid to engage Criminals. Crime will spiral then the globalist will say, hey see black people can't run a country then they start attaching many conditions to lend money.

This playbook was played in my country, don't let it happen in the Bahamas. Their mouthpiece is always some well to do guy like this lawyer fellow who will not be affected when chaos takes over.

You can't be talking about the same Carey Leonard many of us have come to know over the years. And how do you like the job our financial sector did in competing against the taxing authorities of the OECD countries on their very uneven palying field with goal posts moving against the Bahamas at all times? Moral of the story....tell all of these international organizations with their evil agendas to go fly a kite.

Everybody acts in their own best interest even honest people. The key question is whether their interest lines up with yours and the majority struggling population. As to being afraid of competition having a country where you and two others are "ready" is a recipe for disaster. You see BTC?

More Bahamian xenophobia, with arm chair quarterbacking.
If any of you have read even 5% of the working documents i'd be surprised.
As to the negotiation team, I agree, incompetent at best starting with Mr. Laing.
However the initial team fired by Ingraham and Laing was competent.
Either way we in the Bahamas had better clean up our act or we will suffer either way, and we have been in ever increasing measure.