It is getting worse on the island of New Providence which most Bahamians call Nassau.By extension, it getting worse in the rest of the Bahamas.Seventy four percent of the population lies bundled up on an eighty mile island.An island that has for the most part not been properly planned.

Whole settlements have withered away and died in the family islands. I saw that when I visited a family island , a few years ago. The settlement, my great grandmother came from ,died off. The Bahamian people through their political ,religious and civic leaders have no real vision to develop this country. An englishman who is married to a Bahamian lady scoff and laugh at how this country has developed.He said to the class,my relative was in,the Bahamas reminds him of a heavily centralized communist country. All decisions are made in Nassau for the entire country.That is why there is no real interest to decentralize the structure of this country.

The seeds of the violent crime problem and traffic congestion were planted in the seventies. These situations have gotten progressively worse over the years.The transhipment of illegal drugs through the Bahamas is a major contributor to the current state of affairs.The traffickers also had their arsenal of weapons to protect their cargoes.

As for representative democracy,the Bahamas is way less democratic than the United States. Canada,the UK and most of western Europe. All of those countries have layers of highly effective state and local governments. Bahamians only vote based on hate and emotions.They have no real understanding of how governments should work.The average Bahamian has no say how this country is governed after they vote.Both major political parties,The PLP and FNM oppose a real system of local government.They fear that it's introduction will reduce their power.

The Bahamas has a lot of very hard working Haitian migrants, Quite a number of situations have brought that to my attention.Without their labour, certain segments of the Bahamian economy would collapse.Congratulations and best of luck to the young gentleman.

@DawesThere is no property tax that is levied on Bahamian owed land in the family islands.The problem this country has is there is no land registry and many times ,the sale of land is not recorded. It was recommended from 1963,that land registry be set up. The last iIngraham administration drafted laws to address this situation. Both administration since then,has not touched it. This current situation is a boon for lawyers. They make plenty plenty money of it.

@This is Ours. of course, you did not mention the high level of tax avoidance and evasion. Over 700 million owed in unpaid property taxes as of 2021. Those problems go back to the era of the late Sir Lynden Pindling. Now the chickens are coming home to roost,

A founding father of the Free National Movement and it's first party chairman. Bahamian history is not really taught in the schools here. When persons like Dr. Donaldson dies, history dies with them. He should have written his memoirs. He knew some interesting things about the inner workings of the PLP in 1966. He had a very interesting conversation with Clement Maynard when they were both working at PMH.

My mother thought highly of him and his brothers as doctors. He was for a time her physician.
Rest in peace

St. Pauli Girl Beer and Beck's Beers are brands that are owned by InBev. InBev is a Belgian beer conglomerate and is rival to Heineken ,a Dutch conglomerate. Heineken is the majority shareholder in Commonwealth Brewery. They funded and had a close relationship with Burns House. Burns House purchased and absorbed several liquor wholesalers. After doing that, they became the exclusive distributor of Heineken products. Those products included Kalik, Heineken, Guniness and Vita Malt. They stopped the importation and sale of InBev products in their stores

This is what happens when you have monopolies. Monopolies reduce consumers choices, stifle innovation and sometimes keep prices artificial high. Burns House was the leading liquor wholesaler in the Bahamas. They also operate a large number of liquor stores. Heineken through Commonwealth Brewery purchased them and rebranded them as 700 Wines and Spirits. If the Bahamas was a sensible progressive country, the country would have passed anti- trust laws. The Americans did that over a hundred years ago when Theodore Roosevelt was president.

Marlon Johnson speaks with a forked tongue .He was right there when the FNM government zero -rated those bread basket food stuffs. Now he is saying that is the wrong tax policy. Some body with a real PHD said to me, he did not know what he was doing. The person said to me, he is just a cell phone salesman. All the programs he cancelled at the Ministry of Finance, he had to restart.H e never answered the questions that were posed to him about the 2018 budget.Those questions were posed by a former senior FNM cabinet minister who served as Minister of Finance.

Male academic underachievement is not discussed or researched much in the Bahamas. Caribbean academics like the late Rex Nettleford and Dr,Errol Miller have written about it. A white Bahamian said this, Sociology is not studied in the Bahamas like in the rest of the english speaking Caribbean.The late Edward Seaga, a prime minister of Jamaica was a trained sociologist

@This is Ours. You simply do not understand much. The officials at the Ministry of Finance do not live in a bubble like you. I personally do not care much about the Financial Secretary.Some body told me several years ago what was happening and will happen. The Bahamas is on a slippery slope to bankruptcy and the IMF is pressuring this country to deal with it's deficits. The country can not borrow as it use too. So this government like the previous government has to increase tax collection. It is simply by what method. I do not support this rate of tax increase. But i know what they are desperately trying to do.