Are you better off now than you were in '98?

The election of November 1998 was the PLP’s ‘Date with Destiny’.

As I watched the election returns with my mother, father, siblings and other family friends the sense of accomplishment and excitement in the air was palpable. The PLP was finally on the verge of victory!

After encouraging my parents to register and vote PLP for the first time in many years, and with my sister back home after being flown from university abroad by the PLP in order to vote, destiny was finally about to be fulfilled.

Once the election was called, we piled into our vehicles and raced to Court Street and joined the thousands of other overjoyed PLP faithful who had converged on Alaska Hall to celebrate our ‘liberation from the dark days of UBP rule’. What heady days those were!

Fast forward to the present and the PLP has been the Government for the past 12 years.

PLP election slogans like 2003’s ‘We have only just begun, the best is yet to come’ and 2008’s ‘Moving Bermuda Forward’ now ring hollow when I contemplate Bermuda’s situation in 2010.

As a person who has previously never voted for any other party but the PLP, I am asking myself the following questions and I would encourage anyone reading this to do the same:

• Are you better off financially in 2010 than you were in 1998?
• Do you feel safer in your home and more secure walking the streets in 2010 than you did in 1998?
• Do you feel more optimistic about your personal economic future in 2010 than you did in 1998?
• Do you feel more optimistic about your children’s educational opportunities in 2010 than you did in 1998?
• How about tourism? Is tourism in a healthier position in 2010 than in 1998?
• What about black empowerment? Are black contractors getting their fair share of Government contracts in 2010 under this ‘Labour Government?’
• Is housing more affordable in 2010?

The list goes on and on.

There is one thing, however, that the PLP has done very well over the past 12 years and extremely effectively over the past four years under Premier Ewart Brown’s reign, and that is to use the politics of race to effectively demonize their political opponents.

A close second is the PLP’s ability to continue to appeal to their core black, primarily working class electorate, while simultaneously blatantly neglecting and ignoring the wishes of this same electorate. This is brilliant stuff from a political perspective and devastating in real life.

While the PLP has implemented some really good initiatives such as fast ferries, a vastly improved TCD, free tuition at the Bermuda College and allowing certain segments of our community to ride the buses free, the Bermuda we inhabit in 2010 has seen an overall decline from a financial and societal perspective since 1998.

A certain sector, however, has done very well since 1998. They have had the opportunity to increase their own wages, have given valuable Government contracts to friends and family and have generally enjoyed a lifestyle of caviar wishes and champagne dreams, while the rest of us ponder the direction and future of our beloved Bermuda.

Shameful

Nero fiddles, or as in present day fashion, heads off to the golf course, while Rome burns.

I love Bermuda and its people. What has been allowed to happen under the PLP’s stewardship of this country is nothing short of shameful. Bad things happen when good people choose to do nothing. Now, according to one potential PLP leader hopeful, “It’s Bermuda’s Turn?” I am curious as to exactly whose turn it has been over the last 12 years?

I am now a proud member and supporter of the Bermuda Democratic Alliance. We see a Better Way of doing things. A way that is inclusive, transparent, respectful and involves the input of all Bermudians, regardless of race or creed.

We invite everyone who truly cares about the future of Bermuda to join with us in crafting a Bermuda that is better than the Bermuda we grew up in. A Bermuda that we can proudly pass on to our children.

I invite all citizens, including politicians, who have supported and been members of both the PLP and the UBP to join with us in crafting a better Bermuda that is truly representative of all of its inhabitants.

The Bermuda Democratic Alliance will continue to speak to truth. As the late great Bob Marley once said, ‘The truth is an offence, but not a sin’.

Sylvan Richards is a member of the Bermuda Democratic Alliance and a member of the BDA’s executive committee.