January 2, 2012Dear Sir,The message being sent in every part of the world today is that governments have to be accountable to the people and they have to act responsibly and competently. The recent overthrow of the incumbent Government in Jamaica was another signal that, even in our part of the world, incompetence, corruption and the total absence of solutions to problems will not be tolerated.I actually admire the constant beatings of people like LaVerne Furbert and others who use race and a need for control to encourage the continued support of the PLP. Their insistence that a government should be elected solely because they want to be in power, with no regard for ability or transparency or the actual needs of the people of Bermuda, has been effective for 13 years but I think the end is near.When the UBP governed Bermuda the PLP members simply decided that they did not want to be involved in Government. They didn't participate and they didn't learn. In 1998 the PLP had no experience and no members to speak of who actually understood the idea of “paying an employee on Friday” as opposed to being the one being paid. And their track record speaks for itself.The days are over when Bermudians, particularly black Bermudians, can be deluded to vote for continued incompetence, continued and spiralling debt, continued and uncontrolled gang warfare and, probably most importantly, the absolute absence of any sign that the PLP have any idea how to restore the tourism sector and remove the terror that Bermudians experience when job losses hit them in the gut.The PLP has never been a Government per se. They are more like a labour group who hold the power for the material benefit of their personal supporters. They don't solve problems, they don't plan, they don't create anything - they simply rely on the power of race to perpetuate the power for the few. That may have worked until now but the problems created by these shortcomings are now so great that they cannot be ignored. Whatever you think of Bob Richards personally or politically, no one can deny that he knows what he's talking about and that he is as honest as the day is long. His view of our economic issues are ignored for another five years at all of our peril.An election is on the horizon. Do you see the PLP with any answers to the debt situation? $1 billion and climbing. Do you see the PLP with any answers to resurrecting tourism? Do you see any PLP answers (as opposed to a great deal of talk) to the problems of gangs and other crime? Do you see the PLP changing their attitude to International Business in Bermuda? When Paula says that every time she tosses out an expat worker, she creates a job for a Bermudian when in fact she actually probably loses a job for three Bermudians, she just proves that she simply does not understand. When Mr Perinchief makes his stupid, idiotic and offensive comments about what international business “owes” us, no matter that he apologises when he realises just how stupid his comments are, he just proves that he simply doesn't get it.It's time for a change. A massive change. It's time for Bermudian voters, black and white, to vote for people who are capable and transparent. In my opinion, that would be anyone other than the PLP.POLLYSouthampton