In 1989 an Iraqi writer named Kanan Makiya published his ground-breaking book \u201cRepublic of Fear: The politics of modern Iraq\u201d under the pseudonym Samir al-Khalil.\u00a0 An updated edition with a new introduction was published in 1998 by University of California Press with his real name.<\/p>\n
Makiya was afraid to print his real name in the 1989 edition for fear of reprisals from the Saddam Hussein regime.\u00a0 1989 was just two years before Hussein invaded Kuwait and suffered the dire consequences for his ill-advised and foolish decision in the First Gulf War.\u00a0 Interestingly, Iraq spent nearly the entire decade of the 1980s fighting its Islamic neighbor Iran.\u00a0 Iran was led at the time of the so-called First Persian War by Ruhollah Khomeini, better known as Ayatollah Khomeini.\u00a0 He ruled Iran from 1979 to 1989.<\/p>\n
Saddam Hussein served as president of Iraq from 1979 to 2003.\u00a0 As you can see, both dictators began ruling their respective countries in 1979.\u00a0 Saddam Hussein\u2019s ruthless government was disbanded after Iraq was invaded by a coalition led by the United States and Great Britain in March 2003 in the Second Gulf War.<\/p>\n
In the 1998 edition, Makiya analyzes the transformation of Iraqi society under the auspices of the Arab Baath Socialist party between 1968 and 1998.\u00a0 The 1991 Gulf War and the ensuing years had emboldened Makiya to drop his pen name.\u00a0 By 1998, Saddam Hussein\u2019s regime was not as strong as it used to be in the 1980s.\u00a0 Nevertheless, to the ordinary Iraqi citizen and to the Kurdish people, the regime was still a force to reckon with.\u00a0 Saddam Hussein and the Baath party engendered fear and suspicion among Iraqis for decades.\u00a0 Many were afraid to voice their opposition to the regime for obvious reasons.\u00a0 Even a scintilla of dissent was brutally crushed.\u00a0 The Baathist regime had an elaborate spy network throughout the country.\u00a0 Secret Baathist supporters and other Iraqis who were sympathetic to Saddam would rat on their own coworkers and family for simply speaking out against the regime.<\/p>\n
On page 58 of the 1998 edition of \u201cRepublic of Fear\u201d, Makiya stated that as terror struck deeper into the population \u2013 and no longer solely at its margins \u2013 withdrawals, cynicism, suspicion and eventually pervasive fear replaced participation as the predominate psychological profile of the masses.\u00a0 Today, it would appear that fear of the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) has become pervasive throughout The Bahamas.<\/p>\n
Free National Movement supporters as well as PLPs who are civil servants are reluctant to publicly oppose the Christie administration for fear of losing their jobs.\u00a0 A police reservist told me last week that she along with the other reservists on the island of Grand Bahama haven\u2019t been paid for the first three-and-a-half months of 2013.\u00a0 She said that she is afraid to come to the press with this issue because she might lose her job.\u00a0 She has sought remediation from government officials, but no one seems to know what is going on.\u00a0 She is not the first police reservist to tell me this.\u00a0 Another reservist told me over the Easter holidays that he hadn\u2019t been paid for the year as well.\u00a0 The PLP campaigned on believing in Bahamians and putting Bahamians first.\u00a0 So why are so many afraid to criticize the party in a public forum?\u00a0 Why are so many PLPs afraid to openly oppose their own party?\u00a0 I find this deeply troubling for a country that is on the verge of celebrating 40 years of independence.<\/p>\n
I have never witnessed so many Bahamians who are afraid to offer constructive criticism of their own government in a public forum.\u00a0 This never happened under Hubert Ingraham while he was prime minister.\u00a0 Yet PLPs had the temerity to call him a dictator.\u00a0 At least under Ingraham one could criticize him and still have a job to go to the following morning.<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Perry Christie must assure Bahamians, FNMs and PLPs alike, that freedom of speech can coexist with his administration.\u00a0 He must live up to his 2002 promise not to victimize Bahamians.\u00a0 I believe the reports of victimization since May 7.\u00a0 However, I am going to give Christie the benefit of the doubt.\u00a0 I don\u2019t believe that he was behind any of these incidents of victimization.\u00a0 I implore the leader of this country to rein in his loyal supporters who are alleged to be reeking havoc in the civil service.\u00a0 Too many innocent Bahamians in the civil service are being threatened by PLPs.\u00a0 FNMs pay taxes too.\u00a0 If FNMs cannot enjoy the full benefits of this country, then the PLP government should stop collecting taxes from them.<\/p>\n
This country has matured politically since August 19, 1992.\u00a0 We are not going to stand idly by and allow anyone to take us back into the Dark Ages.<\/p>\n
By:\u00a0 Kevin Evans<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I have never witnessed so many Bahamians who are afraid to offer constructive criticism of their own government in a public forum. This never happened under Hubert Ingraham while he was prime minister. Yet PLPs had the temerity to call him a dictator. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10223285771444175_51037792744":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[93,40,142,60],"class_list":["post-34975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinions","tag-corruption","tag-government","tag-incompetence","tag-plp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34975","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/63"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34975"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34975\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}