Nassau, Bahamas — Friday past was another sad day in the life of this country. The nation witnessed the termination of more Bahamians at First Caribbean International Bank.
Since the merger of the banks some years back, there has been a loss of Bahamian talent from the very top to the very bottom.
Bahamas Press finds this troubling; to see scores of foreign talent enter the bank after the axing of Bahamians.
Sometimes we wonder how in the hell does the department of immigration upon request of the Bank allows so many work permits, while young Bahamians cannot find a job and are losing their employment at the local area bank.
What is more disturbing is this, the department with responsibility for workers in the country headed by FNM spokesperson, Dion Foulkes, sits idle saying not a damn word about Bahamians getting fired, while scores of foreigners are being hire in the country; approved by his colleague minister? Some people we tell ‘ya’ have NO DAMN SHAME!
On Friday, FCIB terminated the services of 10 employees. Union President for the bank, Theresa Mortimer, hinted management at the facility gave no explanation for the terminations, which is a direct violation to the labour agreement between the Union and the Bank.
Additionally, Mortimer said, the bank could not advise by what criteria the group was dismissed on; noting that one of the tellers dismissed was recognized for several years of having achieved a stellar record in customer service.
While the foreign banks and other companies commit the inevitable BACKSIDE RAPE on Bahamians, members of the FNM government sit by and do not a damn thing!
For almost five full years they have committed TREASON against the Bahamian people, opting everything FOREIGN! All of a sudden, Bahamians cannot apply for anything and according to them cannot DO ANYTHING! IMAGINE THAT!
Dion Foulkes is mum, PAPA is mum and Brent Symonette is MUM; as they all in the Cabinet Room continue week after week issue work permits and boast of how the department of immigration is making money?
Bahamas Press calls on the spineless, WUTLESS ‘good_fa_nuttin’ JACKASS government of FNM to do the RIGHT THING! We call on the Government to get off its duff and defend the rights of Bahamians or carry their [YOU KNOW WHAT] OUT OF POWER!
I feel for anyone who looses their job security during these difficult times, but I can’t help but to reflect on how my life had been turned upside down at the hands of a group of employees at that establishment. While my home was being built, persons in the bank acted with the developer to release funds for every stage of my home to the developer before the roof was even completed. It was found out that they were being paid under the table by the developer and many other home owners also suffered as a result. These workers were not fired, but they were just transferred to other branches. What deeply saddens me is how persons sit in these banks and watch the hard working citizens being taken advantage of
BP how is it that few can see that we are at stage three of the genocide stages. The Bahamas would soon find itself on the floor of the United Nation explaining to the world how a genocide was aborted. While so many persons hold high positions in the nation few can see that they are sending the Bahamas in a dishonorable direction where love and unity in the national anthemn meant hate and division towards those who belong here. Genocide is a process that develops in eight stages that are predictable but not inexorable. At each stage, preventive measures can stop it. The later stages must be preceded by the earlier stages, though earlier stages continue to operate throughout the process. 1. CLASSIFICATION: All cultures have categories to distinguish people into “us and them” by ethnicity, race, religion, or nationality: German and Jew, Hutu and Tutsi. Bipolar societies that lack mixed categories, such as Rwanda and Burundi, are the most likely to have genocide. The main preventive measure at this early stage is to develop universalistic institutions that transcend ethnic or racial divisions, that actively promote tolerance and understanding, and that promote classifications that transcend the divisions. The Catholic church could have played this role in Rwanda, had it not been riven by the same ethnic cleavages as Rwandan society. Promotion of a common language in countries like Tanzania or Cote d’Ivoire has also promoted transcendent national identity. This search for common ground is vital to early prevention of genocide. 2. SYMBOLIZATION: We give names or other symbols to the classifications. We name people “Jews” or “Gypsies”, or distinguish them by colors or dress; and apply them to members of groups. Classification and symbolization are universally human and do not necessarily result in genocide unless they lead to the next stage, dehumanization. When combined with hatred, symbols may be forced upon unwilling members of pariah groups: the yellow star for Jews under Nazi rule, the blue scarf for people from the Eastern Zone in Khmer Rouge Cambodia. To combat symbolization, hate symbols can be legally forbidden (swastikas) as can hate speech. Group marking like gang clothing or tribal scarring can be outlawed, as well. The problem is that legal limitations will fail if unsupported by popular cultural enforcement. Though Hutu and Tutsi were forbidden words in Burundi until the 1980’s, code-words replaced them. If widely supported, however, denial of symbolization can be powerful, as it was in Bulgaria, when many non-Jews chose to wear the yellow star, depriving it of its significance as a Nazi symbol for Jews. According to legend in Denmark, the Nazis did not introduce the yellow star because they knew even the King would wear it. 3. DEHUMANIZATION: One group denies the humanity of the other group. Members of it are equated with animals, vermin, insects or diseases. Dehumanization overcomes the normal human revulsion against murder. At this stage, hate propaganda in print and on hate radios is used to vilify the victim group. In combating this dehumanization, incitement to genocide should not be confused with protected speech. Genocidal societies lack constitutional protection for countervailing speech, and should be treated differently than in democracies. Hate radio stations should be shut down, and hate propaganda banned. Hate crimes and atrocities should be promptly punished. 4. ORGANIZATION: Genocide is always organized, usually by the state, though sometimes informally (Hindu mobs led by local RSS militants) or by terrorist groups. Special army units or militias are often trained and armed. Plans are made for genocidal killings. To combat this stage, membership in these militias should be outlawed. Their leaders should be denied visas for foreign travel. The U.N. should impose arms embargoes on governments and citizens of countries involved in genocidal massacres, and create commissions to investigate violations, as was done in post-genocide Rwanda.5. POLARIZATION: Extremists drive the groups apart. Hate groups broadcast polarizing propaganda. Laws may forbid intermarriage or social interaction. Extremist terrorism targets moderates, intimidating and silencing the center. Prevention may mean security protection for moderate leaders or assistance to human rights groups. Assets of extremists may be seized, and visas for international travel denied to them. Coups d’¢etat by extremists should be opposed by international sanctions. 6. PREPARATION: Victims are identified and separated out because of their ethnic or religious identity. Death lists are drawn up. Members of victim groups are forced to wear identifying symbols. They are often segregated into ghettoes, forced into concentration camps, or confined to a famine-struck region and starved. At this stage, a Genocide Alert must be called. If the political will of the U.S., NATO, and the U.N. Security Council can be mobilized, armed international intervention should be prepared, or heavy assistance to the victim group in preparing for its self-defense. Otherwise, at least humanitarian assistance should be organized by the U.N. and private relief groups for the inevitable tide of refugees. 7. EXTERMINATION: Extermination begins, and quickly becomes the mass killing legally called “genocide.” It is “extermination” to the killers because they do not believe their victims to be fully human. When it is sponsored by the state, the armed forces often work with militias to do the killing. Sometimes the genocide results in revenge killings by groups against each other, creating the downward whirlpool-like cycle of bilateral genocide (as in Burundi). At this stage, only rapid and overwhelming armed intervention can stop genocide. Real safe areas or refugee escape corridors should be established with heavily armed international protection. The U.N. needs a Standing High Readiness Brigade or a permanent rapid reaction force, to intervene quickly when the U.N. Security Council calls it. For larger interventions, a multilateral force authorized by the U.N., led by NATO or a regional military power, should intervene. If the U.N. will not intervene directly, militarily powerful nations should provide the airlift, equipment, and financial means necessary for regional states to intervene with U.N. authorization. It is time to recognize that the law of humanitarian intervention transcends the interests of nation-states.
To “Dumb *** Larry”,you just educating who,and you sound so dumb, you need to go and educate yourself. We don’t care how many people are employed there now, the bigger picture is that they took the jobs from Bahamians & gave it to foreigners, in our home town & this **** really needs to stop.
It is obvious that the sitting government does not have the balls to say NO to this anti-Bahamian bank. This bank has a reputation of ousting qualified tenured Bahamians and bringing in their own unqualified lite-skinned (dam near white) people.
Based on what Im seeing the Ministry of Immigration is in league with this scurrilous bank and has become an anti-Bahamian institution.
I guess when we are all weeding yard or cleaning up shit around the hotels while Bejans and Jamaicans whip our ass, then we will get a clue.
Until then, God help us, cus this country sold out.
Well maybe its time for us Bahamians to show our collective strength and move our money and our businesses to other banks. There are too many foreign retail banks in the Bahamas. The government has made it extremely hard for Bahamians to open banks. Who are they protecting? None of these banks are encouraging building wealth. Instead they find inventive ways to overcharge on everything that they can do for you as a service.
First Caribbean was created by a merger in 2002. If, according to you “Since the merger of the banks some years back, there has been a loss of Bahamian talent from the very top to the very bottom”, why has there not been any out cry form then? It seems that only when the PLP is in power everything is fine but when the same things happen under the FNM administration, then all hell is breaking loose. Why is that?
BP. I agree with the other blogger that an employer as the right at law to terminate employees provided that the discharged person is given the benefits required by law on termination. But, the wider question should be that after 38 years of independence and vast amount of Bahamian treasure spend on education and scholarships why are there so many work permits still being granted?
Wait this the same FCIB that just hired six (6) new foreigners? So why they keeping the non-Bahamians and sending the local people who don’t get living and housing expenses plus a salary home? BP, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting on MP Foulkes you ain’t foreign so you gets no answers.
BP this is a timely time for you and your investigative team start digging deep over designated types of occupations and the quantity levels of the work permits this FNM cabinet has approved since re capturing the government, would so alarm Bahamians regardless of which political favor of the day you enjoy.
Bran’s oath of cabinet secrecy may restrict him from addressing a lot of where I’m heading, with his having sat around the cabinet table for Immigration matters.
Brent Symonette the DPM / Minister of Immigration / The designated heir Apparent in waiting for Prime Minister, stood in The House and actually bragged about what an excellent revenue source work permits were, noting that year to year there was a sizable increase in revenue from work permit fees.
@ Larry
You “conveniently” dodged the point made by the unionist Mortimer, which is her allegation that the bank management DISREGARDED THE LABOUR LAWS. How about speaking to that, apologist!
Just educating some of the clowns who frequently read this site, if the moderators keep my comment up.
But you are aware that this bank even after these terminations still has the largest headcount of all of the banks located in the Bahamas.
And so what? Atlantis has an even larger headcount. Remember before FCIB there was Two Banks Barclays and CIBC. Collectively, there were even more people.
BP
these duch bags been in power for four yrs and een do a **** to empowered bahamians u really think they give rat *** about 10 more bahamians gone home with no jobs? foreign national movement don’t care about yall ***..
According to Labour laws an employer does not have to give an explanation for termination once the employee is properly compensated. It would be nice to know why one is fired, however, in order to make the necessary adjustments going forward. On another note, FCIB provides such mediocre service more people at the top should be sent home because of poor leadership.
We said according to the Union President, the bank BREACHED the agreement between HER UNION and the Bank! READ BAHAMAS!
Why yinna so don’t like to read bending over backwards to defend?
BP
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