THE LABOUR dispute between workers and management at Morton Salt Bahamas Ltd in Inagua remains unresolved and there are no indications that this state of affairs will change in the near future; especially now that the Dow Chemical Company (Dow) has acquired the company.
Last week, the workers at the salt plant in Inagua made national headlines when local newspapers reported that unionized workers of Morton Salt Bahamas Ltd. had voted overwhelmingly – 76 to one – to strike, following what a senior union official labeled the wrongful termination of a staff member.
This week, The Tribune has reported that Morton Salt has now been sold as part of a multi-billion dollar takeover of its parent company Rohm Haas. The report also said that Dow had acquired all of Rohm Haas’ outstanding stocks at a sale price of over $18 billion dollars.
According to The New York Times Business section, Dow is a diversi... [Read More]
….is BlackFood’s monthly feature that showcases
poets in The Bahamas and across the globe.
Why I don’t answer your calls
If you call for me,
I won’t be there.
I died and went to hell.
The last time we spoke,
you said that I was a crazy bitch.
And that really, really hurt,
because I’m really crazy.
And sometimes, I can be a bitch.
But only sometimes.
Anyways, I just found out
that hell is where all the crazy bitches go.
And since I’ve been here,
it seems like phone calls are a BIG no, no.
So, don’t bother calling me,
cus I died and went to hell.
by Charo Walker
July 2008
Charo is an amateur poet who simply enjoys getting her feelings out on paper.
Black Food is inviting all poets to share their works with lovers of poetry. Simply sumbit your piece to: blackfood.books@gmail.com under the heading "How it go?" to be featured.
As we glow in the joy of being free of Britain’s tentacles on, this, The Bahamas’ 35th Independence Day, the current Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) debate shows that in the great scheme of things we have achieved, fundamentally, little as a nation. For, as a country of, primarily, Africans we still do not have Black Liberation at the fore of our minds. Haki Madhubuti, a renowned African-American author, educator, and poet, in his book “Enemies: the clash of races”, defines liberation as the, “…ability of a people to make and carry out life giving decisions made in their own best interest at every level of human existence.” The EPA, at this moment, is being finalized and this writer seriously doubts that it will be life giving for us or in our best interest at every level of our existence.
The proponents of the EPA, however, argue that The Bahamas stands, at the very least, to maintain the status quo. Above all, they argue th... [Read More]
(NEW YORK, June 23, 2008)—Lack of access to clean water in Haiti has devastating health consequences and constitutes a clear violation of Haitians’ right to water according to both domestic and international legal obligations, claims a new report released today by the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHRGJ), Partners In Health (PIH), the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center (RFK Center), and Zanmi Lasante. The release of the report, “Wòch nan Soley: The Denial of the Right to Water in Haiti,” comes just months after public outrage over rising food prices led to a full-blown political crisis in Haiti.
The 87-page report—which combines health and water data gathered on the ground in Haiti, legal analysis, and discussion of the historical context—presents the findings of a joint project conducted by the groups, who worked together to research, author, and release it. The groups used human rights and public health methodologies to assess the right to water in Haiti by surveying community members, testing water sources, and meeting w... [Read More]
THE BAHAMAS as a member of the Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM) – a grouping that comprises CARCIOM Member States and the Dominican Republic - will, very shortly, sign an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with the European Community (EC). This is a huge undertaking for The Bahamas as this will be our first true participation in the international trading system. In the opinion of this writer, this venture will likely be very detrimental to our well-being.
In fact, Professor Norman Girvan, an Associate of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM) and a current Professorial Research Fellow at the Institute of International Relations at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine Campus, Trinidad and Tobago, in his article ‘Implications of the Cariforum-EC EPA’ points to many disadvantageous aspects of the EPA; the most crucial of which will be shared with you in the next few paragraphs.
The EPA is regarded as being compatible with the Worl... [Read More]
Black Food apologizes to all of its readers for an assertion made in its 29 May 2008 article “We ain fa dem - Part 1’, which stated, “Contrary to what BARF is claiming, when The Bahamas signs the EPA our markets will not be opened to the Caribbean since the EPA has nothing to do with The Bahamas’ trade relations with the Caribbean.”
The Most Favored Nation (MFN) principle, one of the many principles that guide the EPA, will mean signatories to the Agreement will have to treat each other better than they treat third parties, but it also means that all signatories to the Agreement should be treated in equal manner. So this means that the treatment afforded to Europe, by The Bahamas, will also be afforded to the CARIFORUM signatories.
IN a matter of months, The Bahamas will sign a European Partnership Agreement (EPA) - a free trade agreement - with our former enslavers and colonizers and yet there is minimal public outcry. Three years ago, however, the Bahamian public became outraged when the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) proposed joining the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME). Thus it seems that our opposition to the CSME had little to do with our opposition to free trade and had much more to do with anti-Caribbean and anti-African (black) sentiments given the core similarities between the CSME and the EPA.
In fact, yesterday, Bahamians Agitating for a Referendum on Free Trade (BARF), one of few organizations in The Bahamas voicing its concerns about the EPA, held a demonstration in Rawson’s Square to protest the agreement. While some of BARF’s concerns were valid, much of their opposition to the EPA seemed tied to their opposition to the Caribbean and the CSME. BARF contended in its flyer advertisin... [Read More]
This article originally appeared in Granma, the newspaper of the Cuban Communist Party
REFLECTIONS OF FIDEL
IT would be dishonest of me to remain silent after hearing the speech Obama delivered on the afternoon of May 23 at the Cuban American National Foundation created by Ronald Reagan. I listened to his speech, as I did McCain’s and Bush’s. I feel no resentment towards him, for he is not responsible for the crimes perpetrated against Cuba and humanity. Were I to defend him, I would do his adversaries an enormous favor. I have therefore no reservations about criticizing him and about expressing my points of view on his words frankly.
What were Obama’s statements?
"Throughout my entire life, there has been injustice and repression in Cuba. Never, in my lifetime, have the people of Cuba known freedom. Never, in the lives of two generations of Cubans, have the people of Cuba known democracy. (…) This is the terrible and tragic status quo that we have known for half a centur... [Read More]
NO matter how hard they try to wipe out the life and works of Marcus Mosiah Garvey from our history books, his spirit still lives. And much of this ever-burning fire has to do with the tireless work of black historians throughout the Caribbean and North America.
One such historian is Professor Robert A. Hill, a foremost Caribbean scholar and historian, who is visiting the Bahamas this week.
Mr. Hill is a Professor of History at the University of California, Los Angeles and he is also the Editor and Chief of the Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) Papers, a multi volume historical documentation of the papers of Marcus Garvey and the UNIA.
Professor Hill’s first book was the Recovery of Marcus Garvey’s Black Man Magazine, a complete edition of an important magazine that Garvey first edited in Jamaica in 1933, and that he continued to publish until 1938 in England. He has also edited 10 Volu... [Read More]
(San Francisco, California, May 21, 2008). On May 16, victims of the infamous Raboteau Massacre in Haiti received over $400,000 in court-awarded damages. The historic recovery is the result of a 14-year struggle fought by the victims and their families in the courts of Haiti and the United States.
“The Raboteau victims deserve payment of the $400,000 for their injuries and suffering in 1994. But they have also have earned this award through their tireless and courageous efforts for justice over 14 years and in two countries” said Pamela Merchant, Executive Director of the San Francisco-based Center for Justice & Accountability (CJA).
The Raboteau Massacre was a joint military/paramilitary attack on a pro-democracy neighborhood during Haiti’s 1991-1994 de facto military dictatorship, carried out on April 22, 1994. The victims started fighting for justice the next day, when they filed complaints in Haiti with a local judge. The Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI), a public interest law office in Port-au-Prince, took up the case in... [Read More]
THE LABOUR dispute between workers and management at Morton Salt Bahamas Ltd in Inagua remains unresolved and there are no indications that this state of affairs will change in the near future; especially now that the Dow Chemical Company (Dow) has acquired the company.
….is BlackFood’s monthly feature that showcases 
(NEW YORK, June 23, 2008)—Lack of access to clean water in Haiti has devastating health consequences and constitutes a clear violation of Haitians’ right to water according to both domestic and international legal obligations, claims a new report released today by the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHRGJ), Partners In Health (PIH), the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center (RFK Center), and Zanmi Lasante. The release of the report, “Wòch nan Soley: The Denial of the Right to Water in Haiti,” comes just months after public outrage over rising food prices led to a full-blown political crisis in Haiti.
THE BAHAMAS as a member of the Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM) – a grouping that comprises CARCIOM Member States and the Dominican Republic - will, very shortly, sign an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with the European Community (EC). This is a huge undertaking for The Bahamas as this will be our first true participation in the international trading system. In the opinion of this writer, this venture will likely be very detrimental to our well-being.
IN a matter of months, The Bahamas will sign a European Partnership Agreement (EPA) - a free trade agreement - with our former enslavers and colonizers and yet there is minimal public outcry. Three years ago, however, the Bahamian public became outraged when the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) proposed joining the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME). Thus it seems that our opposition to the CSME had little to do with our opposition to free trade and had much more to do with anti-Caribbean and anti-African (black) sentiments given the core similarities between the CSME and the EPA.
IT would be dishonest of me to remain silent after hearing the speech Obama delivered on the afternoon of May 23 at the Cuban American National Foundation created by Ronald Reagan. I listened to his speech, as I did McCain’s and Bush’s. I feel no resentment towards him, for he is not responsible for the crimes perpetrated against Cuba and humanity. Were I to defend him, I would do his adversaries an enormous favor. I have therefore no reservations about criticizing him and about expressing my points of view on his words frankly.
NO matter how hard they try to wipe out the life and works of Marcus Mosiah Garvey from our history books, his spirit still lives. And much of this ever-burning fire has to do with the tireless work of black historians throughout the Caribbean and North America.
(San Francisco, California, May 21, 2008). On May 16, victims of the infamous Raboteau Massacre in Haiti received over $400,000 in court-awarded damages. The historic recovery is the result of a 14-year struggle fought by the victims and their families in the courts of Haiti and the United States.