Rick Lowe
Now I'm no big fan of many of the policies of the FNM Government, but I support the privatisation of BTC. It simply makes economic sense, particularly if the cellular monopoly will end in a few years.
Politicians have stacked the phone company with their cronies over the years to the extent that many of them think it's their personal domain to do with as they please.
And after years, no decades, of complaining about the services they provide, people are saying that BTC is a national treasure. Well blow me down. A national treasure!
Sure BTC makes money. I hope so. It's a monopoly.
If this was the only blog in town our statistics would be through the roof as well.
Don't misunderstand me, BTC has some very competent associates but for the official opposition, the unions, and some of their members to posture that selling a 51% stake to Cable & Wireless instead of a Bahamian group is a horrible idea, is no more than political expediency.
Isn't it late in the game?
Seems it was 1997 when the FNM government of the day paid out millions of dollars and started the privatisation process.
The PLP was elected to govern in 2002 and continued the privatisation process. Albeit they attempted a deal when the economy was much better they thought it best to maintain 51% ownership.
It's now 2010 and a deal is finally signed to sell majority ownership.
Surely any number of Bahamian groups could have been put together to buy BTC during the past 12 years no? But now that the sale is agreed, there's a problem.
I just don't get it?
If both political parties continued the process for over a decade and the unions or BTC associates, or any other group did not surface, all the noise now is nothing more than political expediency, because it surely does not make economic sense.
To quote "Tom Paine" over at The Last Ditch blog, "there has been next-to-no honesty in our national debate, precisely because of the galvanising effect of their transparent honesty on the working-class electorate. Is it too much to ask that our state is run by people elected on the basis of honest debate? Apparently it is, because it means we, the people, will not make the choices the statist establishment wants."
And my friends, that's what we are witnessing here.
