Well blow me down. The Bahamas now has mastered how to sweep dirt under the carpet. We have now become the number 1 “cover-up” capital of the world. No wonder foreigners view us the way they do. We seem to have no respect for the law and our social status is the determining factor, if we are hauled before the courts or not.
We have seen high ranking government officials who have gotten away with, what would send almost anyone else to jail for many years.
The recent alleged acts of plagiarism by the President of the College of the Bahamas seem to smack dead in the mouth, all that a Christian nation is supposed to stand for.
I dare say if a young male from Bain & Grants Town, Farm Road, Kemp Road, Montel Heights, Yellow Elder, Fox Hill, Eight Mile Rock, Cat Island confesses to committing a crime, he would be ceremoniously hauled before the courts with cameras flashing and presented on the evening news, for the whole Bahamas and indeed the world to see. They would be humiliated with handcuffs on their hands and feet, to further disgrace them. There would be no “special committee formed with high ranking clergymen to determine if he should endure all of this.
Dr. Smith confessed to using someone elses material. His apology was admirable, and his resignation should have followed in the very next sentence. His integrity and the reputtation for the College of the Bahamas should have been priority in his decision.
Sad to say, integrity has been totally subtracted from this whole exercise, because, if a student was guilty for the same infraction, they would have been expelled. But no, the “untouchable” Dr. Smith is still in office, surrounded by other lecturers who have now put their integrity on the line, by publicly supporting Dr. Smith and endorsing that what was done should be ignored, because he has done such a good job. Wrong is wrong.
I am baffled how the people who is supposed to instilling in our children the true meaning of integrity, has disregarded their mission for the sake of saving Dr. Smith.
This could be one of the reasons why crime in the Bahamas is growing at such an alarming rate. The small man from over the hill, who has no connections always get the “stink end of the stick” and the well connected get the “advisory team” to sweep their indiscretions under the carpet.
The so called intellectuals think the average Bahamians are really stupid. They play all sorts of games and expect us to agree, just because most of us have not been to institutions of higher learning.
Finally, this “advisory team”, if they have any integrity, should not have allowed anyone to trick them into becoming a part of anything that appears to be “shady”. They should, up front, condemn Dr. Smith and call a “spade a spade”. A terrible precedent would have been set, if this whole ordeal is not done properly, which is nothing short of resignation.
The integrity of the whole Bahamas is now in question AGAIN, because someone is trying to make a wrong right.
Please, for the sake of our innocent children, let us do this one right. Thank Dr. Smith and move on.
By: Ivoine W. Ingraham
