The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune. Now that we have celebrated Christmas and are preparing to usher in the New Year of 2012, I would be obliged if you, the Editor of this fine and outstanding publication would permit me to submit a "wish list" for the nation as we go into a brand new year. 2011 will remain forever etched in the collective memory of The Bahamas as the most dangerous year to date as it relates to alleged homicides. Countless business establishments were forced to shut down or to curtail their activities due to the massive and dysfunctional management of the ongoing road works here in New Providence. Scores of workers were laid off and found themselves without a pay cheque during the holidays. Our politicians, across the board, continue to apparently shuck and jive while the nation appears to be going straight to hell down a slippery slope. No doubt, most of them mean well but is that intention good enough? Very little real legislation was enacted during the last quarter of this year. In fact, Parliament came back from a three months summer break in August and promptly embarked on a six week Christmas break a week or so ago. There is any number of other economic; societal and cultural problems; which beset us and, no doubt, as we evolve as a nation, we will find relevant solutions. Until then, however, with your leave, I wish for the following: * Less partisan rhetoric and posturing from our clueless and erstwhile politicians and their hungry bellied allies and cronies. What they call debates are, in fact, sound bites and bogus in your face small talk; * A drastic and pragmatic re-approach to the ways and manner in which we seek to educate and socialise our school aged children, from the primary level straight to tertiary levels. The model being utilised in Barbados and Jamaica could be adopted in our own country. Additional fully funded and staffed trade and vocational institutions must be established to train those students who may not wish to go further from a pure academic stand point. * The traditional inner city areas of New Providence are in rapid decline and have become blights and eyesores. We are able to borrow huge sums of monies for all sorts of infrastructural works but nothing to encourage the modernisation of these ghetto centres? Not only would the environment be transformed but the tourism plant would be expanded as tours could be arranged for these inner city historical areas as in days gone by. * The criminal and legal justice systems must be upgraded and better managed. The current status quo, where the Chief Justice is the effective Chief Executive Officer of the judiciary, is not working. With all due respect to Sir Michael, to my knowledge, he's never managed a large scale business, as the legal and judicial systems have become. The appointment of a dedicated individual, with the necessary support staff, to actually run the day-to-day affairs of these vital areas of governance is long overdue. * A form of National Health Care should also be looked into and legislated into law. There are far too many Bahamians who are dying due to lack of medical insurance or access to finances to take care of serious illnesses. Some complain that it would be too expensive. Well, I do not subscribe to that because each citizen in a nation is equally as valuable as the next and there must be a social net to provide universal basic health care. * The Small Business Act, long promised by successive governments, must come on stream in the first half of 2012. Small businesses all over the world in democratic countries account for over 60 per cent of jobs and newly created jobs. In this incarnation of the FNM , such businesses and the middle class, have been taxed almost to death and persons and firms are afraid to invest in new businesses or to expand existing ones. * Lastly, the collective church and proponents of traditional values must step up to the plate and engage the minds and spiritual concepts of the average Bahamian. In short, they must come down from their high horses and emerge from their ivory towers before the nation implodes before our very eyes. The politicians and community leaders, on their own, are incapable and clueless about the effective ways and means to bring about the renewing and transformation of an individual's mind and thought process. And so, I don't wish or ask for much for The Bahamas in 2012 but what I do wish and ask for will, I submit, arrest the decay in our society and will revitalise our country. Once these things are done, the sky will be the limit for The Bahamas and her people. To God then, in all things, especially for His Mercies and Providence towards us, in all things, be the glory. ORTLAND H BODIE Jr Nassau, December 26, 2011.