It's hard to believe that this was not a coordinated effort from the Immigration officers, even if not union sanctioned. It does beg the question "whose controlling the workers?"
This debacle by our Immigration Officers at LPIA does erode the positive impression and support Bahamians had of them with their recent professional performance following the Nov 1st change in policy. Those at the forefront of our tourist industry must always bear in mind how important, but fickle this industry is and should not play around with it!
Our Arrival Area at LPIA leaves a lot to be desired during the best of times and should be looked at. May be VIP's, especially those in positions to make a change should actually "walk through" the process to see how frustrating it can be. Both at the Immigration and the "free for all" Customs area! Many have suggested the Customs area should be more organized, with signs specifying "declared vs undeclared" rows, as well as a "Bank Teller" type turn style line. Better management, oversight and accountability is what we need: someone's head should roll, oh wait I forgot it's "government" that I'm talking about ;-(

Remember these are engineers and mechanics, worldwide they are highly sort after and similarly paid. I have no problem with highly technical, intellectually challenging jobs being compensated accordingly. That said BEC is an economic failure, as such their cost of doing business needs to be reduced, if workers are costly then you may need to have less of them. Problematic Human Resource issues are pervasive in the government/ government corporation agencies. That said the main problem with them all is that they are "public" vs private, and there is lack of competition. Any fixes attempted without addressing those two issues, including friggin' around with unionized workers is just tinkering around the ages ;-(

"American Exceptionalism" lol

The NAD model seems more sensible if chosen carefully and allowed to truly run BEC without government interference, which would include retirement of the Chairman position for that period of time.

If BEC can actually run as a competitive private company, even if as a US style "Nonprofit" where profits are pumped back into the company, then it would actually be "worth something" when it comes up for sale. Many folks thought that should have been the process prior to BTC's sale!

Now all that stated above is provided government has a watchdog agency oversee the "private firm" to avoid contract selling via "kick backs" etc. ;-)

I agree: "Police the borders", difficult to do. "Substantial fines to employers" and enablers are both great ideas. These new Immigration actions are a first step, probably in response to the heavy Tax burden being heaped on the Bahamian populace, including more to come.

We can't continue this merry go round, providing social services to an ever growing population with no planning to support it. Yes automatically granting citizenship because you're "born here" is just plain stupid for a tiny country with a small population. It is just as silly as the US- Cuban wet foot/ dry foot policy! Yes it's crazy to make these same "citizens" wait until they're 18 to "apply" for their citizenship, it seems Schizophrenic to me: "you can be a citizen, but may be 'not'"?!

These first step policies will no doubt cause confusion and problems, like the proverbial dominoes, they've been released......or may be not: this apparently is the time to make comments and suggestions, so make them. However government needs to make certain concepts clear, if they want to fix the problems as Bahamians see them. We are tired of being the proverbial donkey, we've stood up (straightened our backs) so we can't be ridden any more (freely or otherwise) by anyone, Haitian etc etc etc: no discrimination, just friggin fed up of this crap!

Yeah, it's called "Hispaniola"

Checkmate!

Our lack of a proper Immigration Policy as well as the dysfunctional US policy regarding Cubans means we will continuously be caught up in this morass. However the lack of details (understandably so) presented in this article creates a number of questions and concerns: he was apprehended by the US Coast Guard, one would think if he had had sensitive information he would have inform them initially. Unless of course their protocols allow good intelligence to slip through the cracks, not to mention the UNHCR rules for assessing who is a 'Political Refugee'. Our problem, locally is that we have no structure to our system that indeed it would be possible for a potentially 'High Profile' refugee to be imprisoned amongst us and we would not know or worse, not care.

One day my children, grandchildren or great grandchildren will live in a Bahamaland governed by the principles of Democracy, not theocracy; where the 97% Literacy will mean well read, educated and capable of free, curious and problem solving intellectual capacity. A people imaginative, proud, but tolerant! I live in hope ;-)

What about "Zoning"?! This is a residential area (Thisisours makes this point). Too often the "authorities" tolerate 'business squatters" putting up structures on public land and opening up shops.....most of these folks don't apply for business licenses, the whole process is a joke! Even if the property belongs to the business owner, we need to enforce (and in many cases establish) proper zoning. Many of the homes in this location are in the $300- $600K range, civil authorities need to protect these folks investments.