Mahogany CoConut Blog

by Angela Goring Our culture is alive and well ! I speak of no other place than Barbados, my Island home. Every year during our festival of creative arts we see the little ones performing skits and songs; although, new ways of putting them over and adding new touches, the inherent Barbadianisms still abound. It does not matter what age you are, you are still able to connect with your past. NIFCA,(National Independence Festival of Creative Arts) the festival of which I speak is really  the National Independence festival of creative Arts. This festival was born several decades ago to co-incide with our Independence celebrations. It was the brainchild of the late Arden Clarke, an attorney ; his wife,the late, Jeannette Layne-Clarke, an accomplished broadcaster and writer, and a group of other cultural visionaries. The idea behind NIFCA was to discover and showcase the best talent the Island had to offer. The artforms covered being: music, drama, dance, visual arts, photograph...

Mr.Basdeo Panday Dr.Keith Rowley Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar Mr.Jack Warner Mr.Patrick Manning Occasionally, we at the Mahogany Coconut Think Tank ,have to endure some pain in exposing the truth. Almost five years ago, Mahogany Coconut was formed because of a group of Caribbean thinkers existing in the Diaspora. The group was mainly internet based and comprised a significant number of Trinidadians and other Caribbean islanders. Many of them have returned to Trinidad and Tobago, to make contributions to their wonderful island state, and they remain committed to our cause of truthfully informing the Caribbean and world of events relevant to our development. The Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, has recently celebrated fifty years of independence and nationhood. At the peak of its economic performance, Tand T was generous to its Caribbean neighbors, and is a second home to many Grenadians who have a long history of seeking economic progress in TandT. Man...

Mr.Peter Wickham The Mahogany Coconut Group is dedicated to highlighting and defending the professional work of all Caribbean citizens. We are especially determined, to promote and support our young professionals in their chosen fields of endeavor, once they indicate a high degree of professionalism and a sense of intellectual honesty ,when defending their public positions. After extremely careful consideration, the Mahogany Coconut Group has concluded that Mr. Peter Wickham, noted pollster, commentator and call in program/talk radio host, has been the victim of senseless and in many cases, undignified assaults on his professional standing, simply because his recent CADRES, poll commissioned by the Nation Newspaper, predicted that the current Democratic Labour Party, stands a good chance of losing the next general elections. We have taken the time, to research Mr. Wickham’s polls and have been advised by experts in his field, that he has an extremely high level of accuracy in...

Dr. Anthony Carter Dr. James Husbands                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              ...

For some time, the society as a whole has been vehement in blaming our teachers for what many consider as deteriorating educational standards. Mahogany Coconut is of the view that such blame is unfounded and unfair. When we examine our educational system, we conclude that the vast majority of our teachers are competent and extremely professional.  However, we do not subscribe to the view that they are poorly paid.  Taking into consideration our resources, their salaries are comparable if not more attractive than those in many developing countries.  We also suggest that our school plant, at all levels, is vastly superior to what obtains in many of our neighboring island states. Since the mid 70’s, the collective DLP/BLP government, has systematically succeeded in damaging the image of our teachers and the general public has supported the DLP/BLP. As far back as the late 60’s and early 70’s, there have been clashes with prominent educators and our political leaders. T...

We join those who correctly state, that we are a terribly hypocritical society, when it comes to gambling in our society. There is no empirical evidence, that casino gambling will destroy the moral fabric of our society. To those who continue to resist its introduction, we remind them that it generates employment and is a form of personal recreation. Gambling is widespread in Barbados. A point clearly made by Mr. Al Gilkes, in a recent column in the Nation Newspaper(Sunday Sun). Stories are legendary about big shot politicians and business persons, losing personal fortunes and plantations changing hands because of losing big poker games. It is a known fact, that one of our most revered, late prime ministers was a master poker player. Many families have been ruined because of addiction to poker and other forms of gambling including horse racing. Quite recently, the current DLP administration, wrote off millions of dollars the Barbados Turf Club owed the treasury. Those who frequ...

Prime Minister Freundel Stuart Mr. Owen Arthur, Leader of  Opposition Ms. Mia Mottley MP. The so-called silly season is upon us. Once more, sooner or later, Barbadians will elect a new BLP/DLP government. Or a new DLP/BLP government. It’s six of one and half dozen of the other. We can predict that none of the manifestos will contain any of the following: (a) Radical reform of the educational system and the abolition of the elitist Eleven Plus Exam, which continues to condemn our children to the equivalent of social and economic gas chambers. (b) Neither will contain the slightest reference to genuine worker/employee participation in company profits. We have mega businesses that either giving the workers peanuts or nothing at all in terms of real ownership. (c) Neither will touch land reform that  will guarantee perpetual state ownership by the citizens of Barbados. The BLP/DLP has sold our prime land to the highest bidders. On the other hand a few rich ...