In all fairness Freddy must now issue a travel warning for France, considering the tragedy tha happened there last night during their independence celebrations. Nearly 100 people dead..many more mowed down by a truck. Donald trump called it an act of war, while Hillary Clinton was more reserved in her comments. The president didn't yet give comments. The sensible thing to do was to issue an general warning for Bahamians travelling abroad to exercise caution and be aware of their surroundings at all times, or let sleeping dgs lie..except the dogs who want to create mischief and mayhem are not sleeping. They are hard at work all around the world.

VAT was suppose to be a tax that replaced customs duties, stamp tax etc. In its true form vat would not have had the stagnating impact it is having now. But your greedy government, after seeing the potential of VAT, decided to keep the customs duties and stamp tax in addition to VAt. Pure double taxation. To them they say it as more quick, easy money and they bragged on how much they were collecting. But because there was no real growth in the economy, it started to feed on itself. So now you have a shrinking or declining economy and government, in their ignorance or greed, or both, continue to double tax. money is being yanked out of the economy before it can exchange hands, before there is any chance for growth. Almost 20% unemployment and 30,000 persons on welfare, no potential for growth unless the leakages are slowed down and new money is injected into the lame economy.

Perry thought that Bah Mar was the God and savior of the Bahamas. So much so he even in his wildest imagination didn't expect what happened with Bah Mar to happen. So there was no back up plan, no alternative plans. Apparently not even any plans to grow the economy if Bah Mar was a success. Yet Perry Christie continues to worship the golden calf. At the expense of the Bahamian people. So this why we is where we is now. Our government worshipping strange gods. Not the God of our fathers.

So then you see the problem of crime that is plaguing the Bahamas and threatening the tourism industry I'd not BJ's problem (at least not exclusively) but Perry Christie, Brave Davis and Mike Halkitas who have failed to provide even an once of stimulus to the local Bahamian economy. Instead they continue to pile on tax after tax, penalty after penalty, threat after threat, and so many persons have chosen to shut their businesses down rather than face conviction. Halkitas seems like he is prepared to see every single Bahamian owned business closed with the exception of web shops. And now only the top two or three of them are operating at profit levels. The other 5 or 6 are drowning in debt. Poor government fiscal policy leads to a dead economy, record unemployment and similar crime numbers. Blame Perry and Mike!

bj is right!!! There have been significant decreases in most crimes including murder. This year. Last year this time the murder count was 80. Today it stands at 62 or 64 depending on who's keeping records. If the declining trend continues the murder count for 2016 can be below 116 and if can even go below 110 which will be the level murders were when this government came to office. The focus now should be on armed robberies, car thefts,house breaking a etc., These are the crimes directly related to unemployment and the state of the economy. The cost of living has skyrocketed thru the roof and with unemployment at record levels these crimes will continue to escalate until the government fixes the economy.

> “We really didn’t realise what had happened for a while,” he said. “The bags were in the van and the next thing we know is then they weren’t there. I wasn’t held at gunpoint or anything like that. In fact we didn’t even see what happened.”

This is what many Bahamians and car renters are experiencing in Miami, Fort Lauderdale again. Their rental vehicles show no signs of forced entry yet their personal items and valuables are gone.

Not too long ago the employees of the car companies were running a scam where they would rent you a car and one of their friends (accomplices) would have a spare key/remote for the vehicle. They would follow you from the car rental terminal and once you make your first stop or two they would enter the vehicle and take all your valuables. After it became obvious that rental agents were in on the scam and after numerous complaints the car rental companies changed their procedures to where you are no longer assigned a specific car, but you are given a row of cars to choose from. This makes it more difficult for agents to know which car is going to be rented and when. But recently one major car rental in Ft. Lauderdale have been offering free upgrades to mini vans. You should be suspicious of this and if you don't need a mini van, insist on getting the car you reserved. In some cities the rental car is brought up to the rental booth for the customer, but these cities are not having the problems that South Florida is having. What they are also doing now is booking you for a whole lot of insuance. Some persons end up paying up to $100.00 a day for insurance and no not realize it until they return the car or when they get their credit card statement. Then its too late to do anything about it. NOW they have persons who play the overly popular pokemon game being lured to various locations and being robbed..what next?

they suit you well, with a pink tie..rotfl

So the former Chief Justice and his party were all robbed in South Florida over the weekend. Maybe Fred's advisory was in order. I think they have started targeting tourists in South Florida again. I know of several incidents where Bahamians were robbed over the past few months, including the band from COB. The target seems to be mini vans. So if you traveling with a group to Florida and rent a van, you should either not leave any valuables in it or designate someone to watch it while others shop, eat sight see and have fun

Government is even setting to do more damage and make a worse situation worse. They are now charging a $100 late fee on business license plus interest on what is due. This is not just a simple 'ok just pay it' as it seem. Some businesses are not making a profit. Some have been operating in the red for several years. So they scrap up some money to bring their national insurance up-to-date. Then they have to renew their garbage collection contract and pay their property taxes. Then when they get to bus license the government slaps a $100 fine on them plus interest. So there is definitely no incentive for these businesses who are losing money to try fight it out. So as they close down governmet revenue will also go down. Unemployment will go up and so will crime. So the national debt will increase and so will deficit spending. This government has its shoes on backwards because it is definitely walking in the wrong direction