The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune

One must wonder if the chairman of the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) takes his role as a political leader seriously when he calls the method used by the Auditor General in determining losses at the Road Traffic Department (RTD) into question.

To cast aspersions when his sincere concerns and plan to resolve the major problem of theft at the RTD should be expressed, he resorts to spitting in the wind of accountability and transparency. A path he and some of his colleagues seem most comfortable with.

Even worse is that substantive Minister Glenys Hanna Martin has not yet offered any serious reason to believe anything will done about the theft, other than blaming the paper (manual) system, as if computers will solve a theft problem. Comments suggesting this is unacceptable behaviour seem to have been left out of her speech intentionally.

Not to mention the blame game that the governing party has resorted to. Do they need to be reminded they are in control of these things?

Equally disturbing in all this is the silence of the Prime Minister, the country’s political leader, who bears ultimate responsibility for it all.

The only reasoned response so far has come from the Controller of the RTD who said he will be setting the foundation for a creative action plan after meeting with officials of the Auditor General’s Department.

This sneering at, and undermining the institutions of ethics and morality by the political leadership condemns us to more of the same and then the added burden of more tax increases to compensate for this madness.

Thomas Sowell in “Basic Economics,” 4th ed. (2010) reminds us that; “Honesty is more than a moral principle. It is also a major economic factor. While government can do little to create honesty directly, in various ways it can indirectly either support or undermine the traditions on which honest conduct is based”.

RICK LOWE

Nassau

May 14, 2016