And yet our distinguished Director of Education send his lacky to Cuba to recruit Cuban teachers whose command of English or heavy accent makes them difficult to understand and often are not even trained in the subject they come here to teach. Oh and also the Cuban government gets a large proportion of the Cuban teachers Bahamian salary, so in effect you could argue that the Bahamian Government is helping support this regime ?

On a past visit many years ago an American in our party was mugged. It was reported to the police and on our return to the hotel about 4 hours later she got all her belongings back. No Cuba is not perfect but people travel because they are curious and the Bahamas will loose many tourists who will on a whim go to see Cuba. Lets face it Bay street has nothing to offer and what a joke when one sees "duty free liquor" when the liquor is actually cheaper in the USA even after tax. Tourists are not fools and word spreads

I want what your smoking !!

Funny, friends of mine went last year and had all hell to get accommodation as everything is booked up

Try a jaded Bay street with East Bay looking like a deserted dump What is there to see on Bay Street apart from cheap tee shirts, jewellery and liquor stores. Havana maybe run down but is rich with History, vibrant and entertaining Just the museum in Havana beats anything on offer here. Years of easy drug money that flowed through the Bahamas could have been used to dramatically improve the infrastructure but was wasted.

I love it when persons like Smith deny reality and know better than International banks. Its really simple Mr Smith this country borrows, borrows and borrows and has no idea or desire to pay it back. Anyway you keep to your views and lets see how you explain lower living standards, a further downgrade and possible devaluation. Oh I forgot you too live on another financial planet.

Whomever gets elected there have to be some very unpleasant actions taken to stave off the ballooning national debt and strong possibility of a further downgrade. Unfortunately most Governments in the democratic world plan their actions with re-elections in mind not what is best for the country. Any serious fiscal actions will hurt Bahamians whether it be unemployment , higher taxes or early retirement.

We all know that it went into the black hoke called the consolidated fund but what pisses every intelligent thinking individual is that absolutely no effort is made to reduce expenditure or the national debt. As for healthcare I am told that Eleuthera has one permanent doctor for an island 100 miles long and shortages of most medical supplies. What a joke when the Exuma hospital has never opened, the Abaco so called hospital is being finished/repaired and a further hospital is slated for central Eleuthera.

Politicians works on a 4 and a half year cycle. First 4 .5 years putting in place programmes, projects job placement to appease the public and the final 6 months doing whatever it takes to get re-elected and maintain that comfortable well paid position. There is no long term thought or planning. Whoever becomes the next government has to face reality and make some tough choices although I am afraid some choices like a further downgrading and possible devaluation will be out of their hands.

I look forward to this article every week as it is refreshingly honest but just to clarify there is government notice placed in public view at our customs which states " from day one of VAT collection the government will start to pay down the national debt". Another lie and just leading on to more grandiose schemes that the country cannot afford.