The authorities in Barbados make up the rules as they go
Unfortunately, Barbados is one of those villages – sorry, countries – in which it's not what you know, but who you know. You'll be amazed at the number of persons in Barbados that you'll come across in positions of authority who do not possess even basic knowledge of the area in which they exercise jurisdiction. Honestly, it's so hard not to blank-stare at some of these imbeciles. And it makes you wonder... how the fuck did they get that position?
I'll tell you how – and it's rarely because of merit. Usually, it's because that person kissed enough ass to get a promotion or a recommendation for one. In some instances, it's even a case of corruption. "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours."
Civil servants don't serve the public, they serve themselves
Too many civil servants in Barbados are pompous pricks with the mindset of 19th century colonial Barbados. They do not have the moral aptitude to treat members of the public to whom they serve with common decency and respect. They see their role not as serving the public, but rather serving the ministers, who in turn serve themselves in their high perches.
The lying and thieving charlatans – sorry, politicians – to whom we elect as part of our fake so-called democracy, know the art of manipulating the unsuspecting public with just the right words, especially around election time – like the ongoing discussion around decolonising the education system or the way in which government services are delivered in Barbados – but, the truth is, these charlatans don't want to change anything at all. What we have in Barbados, really, is cronyism. "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours."
Police officers in Barbados have their own version of the law
During COVID, a foreign business owner told me that the police came to his premises and demanded that he remove all the chairs and tables because apparently dining-in was not allowed at the time. Well, after a quick glance at the COVID-19 protocols that were in force at the time, actually revealed quite the opposite. Dining-in was allowed. I told the business owner and I even showed him the protocols so he could see that he was well within his rights to ignore the officer's direction, and do you know what he said to me? "I know, but I'm a foreigner, and they will shut me down if I don't comply." And that, in just a few short words, shamefully describes Barbados in a nutshell. The authorities make up the rules as they go, and treat foreigners with quiet disdain. Unfortunately, foreigners to the village of Barbados – sorry, the country of Barbados – are regularly subjected to subtle xenophobia, and sometimes, even extreme xenophobia. Whether a person is from Dominica, or Trinidad, or Canada, or the UK, or Germany, or China – it doesn't matter! Almost every Bajan does it, and it's embarrassing how nobody can see the obvious hypocrisy of their mindset. So, we want to treat foreigners with the same type of discrimination that our ancestors fought to bring to an end, leading up to independence? Is that, is that it?
Anyway, it's quite likely the police went to his business because he was a foreigner, and since every dumbass police officer has their own interpretation of the law, they issued an unlawful direction which was not consistent with the COVID-19 protocols. If I didn't know any better, I imagine a competing business asked a friendly police officer to go over to his business. So, basically, the police used illegal and arbitrary power against a law-abiding business owner who committed the unfortunate crime of being white and having a foreign accent.
Now, don't get me wrong, Bajans were also targeted by the police during COVID. A famous example was an eatery in the Deacons Farm area, where the police directed the proprietor of the restaurant to shut down as they claimed the business was not allowed to operate on Good Friday. However, the COVID-19 protocols expressly allowed restaurants and cook shops to operate on that day. The business owner called the Prime Minister, and it was only after she spoke to the police officer, asking basic questions like "[are patrons] adhering to physical distancing?" and "[wearing face masks] when not eating or drinking?" that the officer realised he had no clue what the rules were. Anyway, on both questions, the answer was "yes", so the Prime Minister asked the dumb cunt officer an obvious follow up question... "so what's the issue?" Well, after having that question thrown in his face, it clearly exceeded the police officer's mental capacity because he promptly left the business owner in peace.
But, see what I mean? The police make up the rules as they go.
I've seen people being handed fixed penalty notices by police officers for merely parking on a residential street, despite the fact that it is completely lawful to park on a residential street in Barbados unless the vehicle is either obstructing traffic from passing through, or parked in an area prohibited by signposts. And it's not like the Ministry of Transport and Works ever bothers to install signposts correctly or at all, or keep any of them maintained. 🙄
Unfortunately, these are the types of things that happen in a village – sorry, country – when clinically-proven retards obtain power. Like I said, the police make up the rules as they go, and the law courts couldn't care less if they tried. Even if it is patently obvious that the police are wrong, the courts are more likely to take a police officer's word over yours (sort of like how, during colonial times, the word of a white man in court was twice as valuable as the word of a black man – just switch white man for 'police officer' & black man for 'any member of the public' and you'll see that it's literally the same colonial-era two-tier justice 😂). By the way, even if you manage to successfully argue your case in court and get a ruling in your favour, the courts pretty much NEVER reprimand the police officer(s) involved, or apologise to the persons affected by their actions.
Immigration officers in Barbados have their own version of the law
Lol, did you think it was just police officers? Sorry to disappoint! 😂
Within the Caribbean, we have a political union called the Caribbean Community (commonly known as CARICOM), and Barbados is one of the member states. Think EU, but not quite as batshit insane... yet. Anyway, under the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, almost all CARICOM citizens have the right to set up a business in other CARICOM countries under a programme called the Right of Establishment. Technically speaking, there is an application process, but it is basically a formality. As long as a CARICOM citizen is running a legitimate business in another CARICOM country, the immigration authorities in that country are legally required in almost all cases to grant permission for that person to reside there.
I remember having a conversation with someone from another CARICOM country – I won't mention which country – but they were describing to me, in detail, how immigration officials here in Barbados were making up the rules as they go, and the rules seemed to vary based on which officer they were speaking with. 😂 I wasn't all that surprised – this is Barbados after all, but the sheer incompetence of what I heard following that made my eyes roll so hard.
When they first went to the Immigration Department to apply for permission to run a business in Barbados, the immigration officer said that they needed to apply for a work permit. They tried explaining to the officer that they were applying under the Right of Establishment, but the officer insisted they had to apply for a work permit. So, they applied for the work permit (which cost them thousands of dollars) and the application was approved. Several years later, they went back to renew the work permit, and a different officer said "no, you need to apply under the Right of Establishment as you are a CARICOM citizen", and they were handed a completely different form. So, it turned out the first officer was wrong, despite being so arrogantly confident in their knowledge of the law. 😂
They also had a situation on a subsequent visit where an immigration officer rejected an application form because apparently one of their photos needed to be certified by a Justice of the Peace, and yet on another day, a different immigration officer accepted the same type of application form without asking for one of the photos to be certified. Fucking imbeciles. 🙄
Immigration officials don't know the law. They just make up the rules, like everyone else.
Government ministers in Barbados make up the rules as they go
Under the last government headed by the DLP (the Dumbass Labour Par—*checks notes*—sorry, the Democratic Labour Party) of 2008 to 2018, Barbados had its credit rating downgraded multiple times. For example, in June 2009, Standard & Poor's downgraded the island's credit rating from BBB+ to BBB, and again in October 2010 from BBB to BBB-, and again in July 2012 from BBB- to BB+ (at this point becoming junk status), and again in November 2013 from BB+ to BB-, and repeatedly downgraded thereafter until it reached crisis levels from 2017 onwards. In March 2017, for example, the credit rating reached the sad depths of CCC+, and in June 2018, from CCC+ to SD (Selective Default), which the village of Barbados – sorry, the country of Barbados – achieved after the newly-elected government of 2018 decided to default on some of its foreign debt obligations.
The Dumbass Labour Party (DLP) lost the election in 2018 and has been out of power since. We've had a supermajority BLP (Barbados Labour Party) administration since then. What's the difference between the DLP and the BLP, you ask? Huh, good question. Well, politics in Barbados is largely driven by promises of free things that we can't afford, personal attacks on other candidates, and maybe a few small examples of actual policy differences. Anyway, Mia Mottley has been the current Prime Minister of Barbados since 2018. That bitch annoys the fuck out of me, but OK, she has stabilised the village – sorry, country's – economy, so there is that. But, my god, she can talk and talk and talk (like most Bajans), but when she does talk, sometimes you just wish someone – anyone – would give her a sock to shove in her mouth to stop the bullshit from coming out. Her trademark catchphrase is to talk about the "climate crisis", a popular topic of pseudoscience invented by the same western communists that are frighteningly close to seizing power in countries across Europe and North America.
Anyway, in 2017, in the midst of a sewage crisis on the south coast of the island (with literal sewage flowing the streets) and rapidly dwindling foreign currency reserves, the Dumbass Labour Party introduced a 2% Foreign Exchange Fee on the purchase of foreign currency. It didn't just affect the purchase of foreign cash, but also foreign transactions on Barbados Dollar bank accounts, including card transactions. Basically, whenever a transaction requires foreign currency to settle the payment, we're charged 2% on the Barbados Dollar amount.
It turned out, this 2% fee was being collected unlawfully, because the Dumbass Labour Party forgot to pass a law to legalise its collection. So, the banks had been charging customers – and paying to the Central Bank – 2% on foreign transactions for three years, completely illegally, before the current administration (the BLP) forced through the Exchange Control (Amendment) Act, 2020 to retroactively legalise the collection of the 2% fee all the way back to July 17th, 2017. All because the government told the banks to start collecting and remitting the fee, and nobody in the village of Barbados – sorry, country of Barbados – bothered at any point in time to check whether the law had been updated to legalise its collection beyond the four month grace period allowed by the Provisional Collection of Taxes, Act, Cap. 85.
Like police officers, like immigration officers, like civil servants... ministers make up the law as they go.
It's shocking how often Parliament rubber-stamps laws with "validation clauses" to basically retroactively legalise what the government had previously been doing illegally. For example, they did it at least once in 2023, under Section 2 of the Road Traffic (Registration Fees) Order, 2018 (Validation) Act, 2023, and at least three times in 2024, under Section 2 of the Barbados Revenue Authority (Appeals Tribunal) (Validation) Act, 2024, Section 15 of the Income Tax (Amendment) and Validation Act, 2024 and Section 2 of the Health Services (Medical Reports) (Fees) (Validation) Act, 2024 (the latter being an egregious example because it validated fees that were illegally collected since January 1st, 1990).
Admittedly, this type of incompetence isn't unique to Barbados. I mean, just look at Jamaica, where they pushed through retroactive legislation in 2018 to legalise the collection of fees that its Transport Authority had been illegally demanding and collecting from Jamaicans between December 1st, 1989 and December 8th, 2015. Fucking thieving bastards.
Conclusion
What can I say? The plebs get prodded every five years by the professional narcissists seeking re-election, and once they're back in power, they revert to being the self-serving, self-loving, self-fulfilling oligarchs that we know and love.
And the icing on the cake? Nobody cares about anything in Barbados.
It's all about "me, myself and I".