Put away your ego and step aside, Mr Bush

The barbarians are at the gates of Cayman.  But they are inside the gates trying to keep them closed to the righteous advocates of democracy and good governance. Caymanian nationalism is the latest pawn in this game of political control and backside protection that has been going on for the last several years.  Suddenly it is un-Caymanian and unpatriotic to call for the Premier to step down because it happens to also be what England would think is right.

Some mischievous Englishman at the FCO caused the Premier to draft, sign and fax a letter to Stan Thomas demanding a payment of the balance of $350,000 for apparently accomplishing a rezoning of property on West Bay Beach. Some mischievous Englishman at the FCO set him up by having one of his associates illegally import enough explosives to take down half of George Town and he unwittingly involved himself by apparently ordering the release of the explosives, despite the serious nature of the offence involved!  And some mischievous Englishman concocted some complicated circumstances which formed the basis for some other investigation of “financial irregularities”!

So the story goes that it is some English agenda, some English conspiracy, against the Premier, all cleverly orchestrated by the FCO. Clearly the English want to have Cayman fail and become another Turks and Caicos. They want to be stuck with a bitter pill three times the size of the one they had to swallow with TCI and a liability to guarantee of $1.5 billion. And they are committed to this objective because they don’t like McKeeva Bush and simply want to get at him? I am sure Mr Bush thinks that highly of himself but I can assure you that a country dealing with their own economic problems of a double dip recession in the midst of a political and sovereign debt crisis in Europe has more important issues to focus on.

Why is it that a country of intelligent people should accept any of the nonsense described above? It is completely illogical and defies belief.  In the absence of an Arden McLean approach to immediately clear one’s name, you must blame someone else. Who better to point the finger at than the usual English boogeyman that despots of other current and former British territories have held up as a distraction to conceal their behavior and give the people someone else to direct their ire at?

Mr Bush is the subject of three separate criminal investigations, one of which involves the illegal importation of enough explosives to take down the whole of Camana Bay. And he maintains that there is no reason for him to step aside until the investigations are complete? Let me list some reasons why he must do that which any adult would comprehend:

• Avoid or minimise the reputational harm to the country
• Minimise or eliminate the potential that the Premier could use his office to  intimidate or pressure witnessescompromise evidence
• Minimise or eliminate the potential that the authority of the Premier could be used to 
• Minimise or eliminate the potential that the Premier could intimidate the investigators
• Minimise or remove the potential that the Premier could generally interfere with the investigation
• Ensure that the investigation can be conducted fairly and completely
• Demonstrate that  the Premier is not above the law in any way and is treated the same as anyone else in the eyes of the law

It is important to note that for the things under his control it is the possibility that it could happen and not just the likelihood that it would happen that is important. I am not suggesting that the Premier would necessarily do some or any of these things.

Imagine that the Commissioner of Police was the subject of these criminal investigations and not Mr Bush.  Who do you think would be out there screaming vitriol against the Commissioner and demanding that the Governor immediately remove him despite his protests of innocence? He would say it just wouldn’t be right and it is incomprehensible that he could remain in office and expect an investigation to be carried out fairly, and anyway the Commissioner is not above the law and there is no way he deserves to be treated differently than any young civil servant facing such an investigation. If that was Mr Bush, he would be right. But of course his “substance over form” approach and his value of himself is such that the rules are what he says they are and he says they don’t apply to him, and his colleagues all follow the Deputy’s lead and curtsey in agreement.

The constitution does not have a provision to cause the Premier to resign or step aside in the face of criminal investigations because it assumes that the person holding such a post will be a man amongst men, possessed of a degree of honour and capacity to immediately recognise what the appropriate course of action would be. It assumes that he would immediately step down to avoid damage to his office and his country. There is a presumed back up if that assumption should prove flawed. The other leaders of the country should surely be capable of summoning the necessary degree of honour and strength to cause the Premier to be removed either permanently or temporarily in the best interest of the country where he is too weak as a leader to do so himself.

We appear to have had one question answered and will have to wait and see whether the rest are equally weak or if they do indeed possesses the honour and strength to put aside self-interest and shoulder the interests of the Country.