The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

I was incredulous and saddened to see videos of peoples’ homes being bulldozed in Abaco on the orders of our government. Am I delusional or did I not understand when it was revealed that there was a housing shortage in Abaco, and the Ministry in charge of remedying the damage done by Dorian had not made sufficient headway in repairing damaged homes or rebuilding destroyed ones.

Not many weeks ago we were hearing of legislation being enacted which would create a subdivision and opportunities for young professionals to own a piece of the rock and opportunities for them to build homes to raise their families.

Is there a message here? Was it not possible to engage in dialogue with the persons, mostly laborers and farmers, in the now demolished or about to be demolished homes and give them the opportunity to purchase the land they were occupying? If the houses were below code was it not possible to make arrangements to bring them to code, then, if this was not possible make a decision to bulldoze and make other arrangements.

Where is the humanity in this situation? To make people homeless with no immediate concern to have them suitably rehoused.

There are now persons who are in similar circumstances in New Providence who are now fearing a similar fate. Some have been In occupation for over 25 years so hopefully the limitation period will come into play.

An election looms and my mind goes to that brilliant man’s definition of insanity, which, when paraphrased, aptly describes our politics. We vote out one group, then vote out the new group, and then vote in the old group again and so on ad infinitem hoping for a different result. This is insanity.

It is only left for me to decide if I will spend Election Day on the beach or continue to participate in this insanity.

JEANNE THOMPSON

Nassau,

May 15, 2021.