The Tribune

By KIRKLAND PRATT

I listened in to a local talk show last week and found some of the suggestions toward enhancing our Bahamian identify interesting. Many callers suggested that all radio stations play Bahamian music all day – every day until July 10. “Certainly” they said, “people would get what it means to be Bahamian after all that exposure.” I took exception. To inundate the masses with things cultural is counterproductive. As I see it, independence is a mind set. It is an awareness, celebration and embodiment of a country’s progressive journey towards sovereignty. Empowerment (not control) is independence.

Dr Betsy Vogel Boze, president of the College of the Bahamas, said it herself in a recent interview with Jeff Lloyd. She was asked, “Why an American is president and not a Bahamian”, to which Dr Vogel Boze replied in agreement, “Why not a Bahamian.” The good doctor went on to state emphatically that she did feel it would be in the best national interest to employ a Bahamian as the College of The Bahamas president. She quickly sanctioned the need for succession planning and assured the host that this was currently being done with Bahamians at the college.

Independence is the government’s ability to implement functional succession planning with the view towards empowering the masses so as to mitigate reliance on foreign expertise. Bahamians must demand leadership that is predicated by vision. We must never just consider the now, but the legacy that this generation will leave for the one to come. Succession planning is independence.

Our environment needs an advocate in the citizenry. In an online post about the early Save Clifton movement, Koed Smith stated: “Mystically, this sparked a level of passion in me that was so deep-rooted, that I felt something come over me at that very moment that this was a part of “my calling”. I was driven by this to join the growing chorus of protest and civil disobedience to get the government to listen, fall in line and change their minds about destroying this unique historical, cultural and spiritual preserve lust for the sake of money-hungry investors who had come to simply rape and plunder.”

Koed Smith understands all too well that independence and reverence go hand in hand as he himself seeks to preserve a wonderful natural Bahamian treasure. Environmental sensitivity is independence.

The culture of the former British colonies has been tremendously influenced by the philosophies of the past rulers. Caribbean people from these territories tend to regard their endemic cultural expressions as primitive, vulgar, and inappropriate. These views extend to language, cuisine, dance, and other forms of cultural expression. The term “local” carries with it negative and diminished connotation in the Bahamas.

Consider how many Bahamians flock to Trinidad annually for Carnival but shun Bahamian Junkanoo. British gentility and conservatism are often regarded as superior to Afro-Caribbean sensibilities and as such, native culture is deemed colloquial while Colonial ideals are regarded as high-culture. This is revealed in the respective manifestations in officialdom all over the British-Caribbean and ranges from the courtroom to the boardroom. We have resisted the urge to find our own way of doing things, in favour of an Orwellian masquerade of British nostalgia. Self-love is independence.

On July 10, when the last firework fades, independence will still remain a mindset, not a date on the calendar. We as Bahamians ought to acknowledge this truth.

Lift up your heads Bahamas. Keep thinking, you are good for it.

• Kirkland H. Pratt, MSCP, is a Counselling Psychologist with a Master’s degree in Counselling Psychology with an emphasis in Education. He lectures in Industrial Psychology and offers counselling and related services to individuals and businesses. For comments, contact kirklandpratt@gmail.com.