Last week one of our Cabinet Ministers was asked by his Chief Officer (the most senior Civil Servant in the Ministry) to provide evidence to support an expense-claim before submitting it for reimbursement. The Minister - an arrogant bully at any time - went bananas at the affront to his dignity and cursed out the unfortunate CO in front of the whole staff. "How dare you!! I am a born Caymanian and you are just a piece of ****ing driftwood! Get the **** out of my office! Go on - **** off!"
Never mind the cussing, it is the "driftwood" usage - and our Premier's support for the outburst - that will probably cost his Party the next election. That the Chief Officer was a highly respected woman (foreign-born, but with bloodline-Caymanian children by her bloodline-Caymanian ex-husband) illustrates the desperately poor quality of our political leadership these days.
Ever since I began my blog (website) in 2011 I have bewailed the prevalence of social tensions between Cayman's expats and many of the "bloodline" Caymanians. But the tensions are normally kept in a cupboard, except during election campaigns. This latest incident warrants a dispassionate analysis of its likely effect on our Islands' expat communities. I'm posting this brief summary now just to give a heads-up to readers of this Cayman forum. Anybody thinking of coming here to live needs to know how things stand politically.
A ferocious anti-expat outburst
Hello Gordon,
Thanks for your candid insights, very helpful as always.
It's sad to see how the powers that be consider expats there as being so much flotsam and jetsam that has simply washed up on their shores.
Rather than supporting this racist outburst your Premier should have denounced it publicly and sacked the Cabinet Minister. With any luck your prediction will come true and it will cost him the next election.
A very Happy and Prosperous New Year to you and everyone on the Cayman Islands Forum.
Cheers,
James Expat-blog Experts Team
No greater sign the minister is scamming the state than his reaction right there.
For those interested, I have just posted a piece called "Standards in Public Life" on my website. The title is ironic: there actually exists a formal standing body called "The Standards in Public Life Commission". No word from its members on the politician's crazy outburst, of course. Sigh. (Maybe they see nothing wrong with it!)
Or maybe they do not want to see anything wrong with it as they would be rocking the boat and perhaps lose their position at the trough.....
