#BTColumn – Problem or solution?

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by this author are their own and do not represent the official position of the Barbados Today.

by Kemar Sobers

I first wish to extend condolences to all families and friends who have lost loved ones to COVID complications. I also wish everyone who has been battling or have battled COVID a successful recovery. I sincerely apologise to anyone who may be angered by my words.

After nine months of doing so well in handling the pandemic, I feel as though we became individually irresponsible. I arrived in Barbados in December and was taken aback at how relaxed we as a people became.

I remember being asked by an airport staff “were you social distancing on the plane?” In response to my annoyed look as I asked a fellow passenger to observe the physical distancing protocols. I had to do this quite a bit while there and I am not sure if it was because of my experience from residing in a COVID hotspot.

I remember me a couple times even dropping my guard given the environs and living with a shadow of what-if over my head?It was a feeling at times of “when in Rome, do as the Romans”.

As a Barbadian visiting Barbados, I had the privilege of seeing the locals versus tourists played out and truth is at times it has been annoying.

For months, I saw comments about people saying government protocols are too relaxed, yet we as a people both locals and visitors decided not to protect ourselves at all times.

The battle against the pandemic was never and will never be the government’s battle alone. We must fight as a team individually and collectively just as a team does when it wants to win. We as individuals can be our own star players in this battle as we protect ourselves and by extension those among us who are in the high-risk categories battling chronic illnesses.

Government’s role is always to strike a balance in providing for and protecting its people. This is what the government sought to do and successfully did as we followed protocols in the early stages of this pandemic. Were some actions taken a bit too late? In hindsight, yes, but note no one has the perfect way to manage this pandemic and every system can be breached, including Australia’s as we recently saw.

With tourism being the bread and butter of our nation, our government sought to provide and protect by having restrictions while expecting us as locals and visitors to be rational and responsible. This obviously reminded us that “ya shouldn’t put all ya eggs in one basket”.

The reliance on tourism is a fault of successive governments from the immediate post – independence period up until the current period. It is my humble opinion that the last global recession was the perfect opportunity for us as a nation to diversify our economy and invest in agriculture and manufacturing, to provide greater food security, reduce foreign exchange outflows and potentially earn increased foreign exchange from exports.

Further, it was also an opportunity for us to embark upon an aggressive program of digitising Barbados; from as simple as being able to apply for certificates of character, passports, vehicle registrations, among other services.

As these would have been developmental initiatives, we would have likely been able to benefit from low interest development funding and maybe even grants. This would also have allowed us to rebrand our tourism product and make it more authentic and reflective of Barbados in terms of food, furniture and the overall experience.

I say all of this to say, the government’s decision of not closing the border was a brilliant one though not most popular and it could have worked if everyone did their part. Despite a few quarantine breaches if we treated everyone as though they potentially have COVID we likely would not be in our position today.

If each and everyone of us think about the safeguards we have in our safe spaces, if one too many breaches those safeguards, it no longer becomes a safe space and that one too many can be just one.

Let us from this day forward ask yourself do we want to be that one who makes it unsafe? If you answer anything but “no”, then you yourself are part of the problem and not the solution.

Kemar Sobers, FCCA, CA