The Ministry of Works does very little maintenance on this island. Replacing road signs, painting road markings, cleaning drains and minor road patching. They can not be bothered to do these trivial things.

Correction, Marlon Johnson is not a former financial secretary.He is merely acting while the financial secretary was sent on leave by the FNM government. That was an act of victimization.
This is how this country functions.

On to the main topic.The Bahamas has serious issues with literacy, numeracy and education in general.There is a high level of male underachievement in education. That is seen in the enrolment and graduation levels at tertiary institutions in this country. The College of the Bahamas at the time did a study of girls and boys school perfomance.They concluded that the sexes were even at primary but boys fell behind and stayed when they reach puberty.There is also a belief in this country you do not really need a good education to make a living here. This is partly due to the tourism industry we have. There is also a report done by the IDB in 2006. They said about forty percent of the males do not graduate from the public school system. They were looking at the link between education achievement and the crime rate.

There are bright spots out there.There are parents and civil groups who are concerned about this. There are quite a number of programs out there.It is to the parents and guardians to enroll the children in these programs.

There is no town-planning in this country except in Freeport. Town planning through their actions or non-actions have destroyed or made communities worse on this island. A white bahamian as well as a black bahamian told me this.

He is simply a self -serving individual. He is in it for the money,power and perks.

Law reform commissioner was around from the days of the late Sir Lynden Pindling. He appointed one during the eighties. Hubert Ingraham appointed one also. The law reform commissioner is a very important job.

The Bahamian parliament is way behind in it's performance.There were many archaic laws on the books. Hubert Ingraham said that when he was prime minister.He said there were many laws on the books that don't make sense in the modern Bahamas. The parliamentary system needs to be reformed and real local government introduced. Most parliamentarians are just local government officials here in the Bahamas and are not legislators.

A pebble in an ocean of debt. The Bahamas needs several years of economic growth and budget surpluses to make a dent in it's large debt..This is nothing to talk about or celebrate.

@ Sheeprunner12.This is a back-handed way to increase compensation for civil servants. The Nassau Guardian in an editorial some years pointed out the salary anomalies in the civil service..

What should happen is there should be a service wide review of salary scales within the civil service. That should not be undertaken by the Ministry of Finance but by the Ministry of Public Service. That should be done over a number of years. Both political parties are culpable for this situation. They simply do want to do the hard work in governance.

That is why the Revenue Enhancement Unit was established for. It had an early success collecting ninety million dollars of outstanding taxes in six months in 2016. It was disbanded by the Minnis Administration in 2017. Circumstances force them to restart in 2019. Of course,the media here in the Bahamas simply do not bother to understand public policy. They simply print press releases.

The Bahamian political elite do not want an effective local government. An effective local government will reduce their political patronage and power. Renward Wells ,the minister for local government in the last administration made this comment.If you have real local government, what will the MPs do.He also said that the report prepared by the committee looking into local government on New Providence, gave the proposed local government officials too much power.

The Bahamians who fly to Florida to shop, don't realize this.All of those cities they love to shop in are governed by local government and not the President of the US and his cabinet.Miami, Fort Lauderdale ,Hialeah and Orlando. Some body made this comment in a text to the morning blend talk show on Guardian Radio this morning.They should do a series of programs to educate the Bahamian people about local government.

@ The Oracle.
Laws should be constantly reviewed, updated, amended and repeal. New laws should also be drafted and passed to reflect the changing circumstances of the country. One of key people in this regard is the law reform commissioner. Bahamians have no understanding of why that position exist and it's function. The Bahamas parliament is way behind in it's legislative function. It has gotten worse over the last three parliaments.
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