Dangerous boaters

August 18, 2009

Dear Sir,

I would just like to express my concerns for safety in the water.

Last night, my boyfriend and I went for a leisurely swim at 9 Beaches right after work. While we were floating around on the water, a guy on a Jetski, who had been sat by the dock chatting to two girls, sped off from the dock without looking ahead (because he was too busy eyeing up the girls) and came hurtling straight towards us at top speed.

My boyfriend and I started shouting and just as he was maybe two feet away from us steered away in order to avoid going straight over our heads. I have to say that I saw my life flash before my eyes. Just to clarify the conditions, the time was around 6.30 p.m. so it was still very sunny and light outside and I had a noodle to help me with my buoyancy with luminous yellow floats on each end making us clearly visible.

Please! If you are going to be responsible for operating any kind of vessel in the sea, follow the safety precautions to avoid a fatal accident. Next time it may be you who is the victim of total disregard and irresponsibility.

NOT AMUSED

Sandys

The Caliph of Camden

August 8, 2009

Dear Sir,

One of the hallmarks of true leadership is that the authority of the leader is acknowledged and accepted – legitimised – by people's respect. Pseudo-leaders, by contrast, have to wield power in order to impose their authority; they do not command any, or enough, respect or trust from the people to legitimise their authority otherwise. Wielding power is the only recourse pseudo-leaders have to exercising their authority over people. (And when we say "people", we mean ordinary law-abiding citizens, not criminals or others who need to be reined in by the power of law for the good of the rest of the community.)

The authority of the true leader, moreover, is vested in the person, not in the office. If it were the office, rather than the person, by which true leadership were measured, we would have to respect many pseudo-leaders throughout history whom otherwise we could not possibly trust or respect (Mussolini, Hitler, Franco, Nixon, Cromwell, Nero, amongst many others).

An extreme example that proves (or at least supports) this principle of true leadership was Mahatma Gandhi. Throughout his life Gandhi struggled for the freedom of his people and his country – which included, significantly, Muslims and Hindus, who were implacably divided by the force of their different religious beliefs – not by wielding power over them, or by the exercise of power towards the British colonial masters of India at the time, but simply by the force of the people's respect for his authority. Gandhi understood, by divesting himself of all the material trappings of power, that the real power and authority of leadership devolved not from himself but from his people, which was transmitted, flowed through and was manifest by the vehicle of his person.

The Caliph of Camden is not and never will be a true leader. His is the leadership of office, of position, not of the person – nor much less of the people. His authority derives from the power of that office, as the leader of a political party, but not of the community at large. Of course there will be some who respect him and think of him as their "leader", because they identify with his cause (whatever that might be). But that is a very limited kind of authority subject to approval from a small section of the community, not legitimately derived from the authority of the whole community.

If it were desirable to remove the Caliph of Camden from his lofty position because of the nature of his pseudo-leadership (that is, because he has no consensus of authority from the people), two things have to happen more or less simultaneously. First, there has to be effective and trustworthy leadership by an Opposition that commands the respect of people who otherwise have no choice but to support the Caliph of Camden's party, if not the pseudo-leadership of that party (ie., him).

Secondly, the highest officials in the Camden Caliphate must stand up as a united force and demand a change of leadership, not only for the good of the party, but more importantly for the long term good of the country and the people of Bermuda. (For that to happen, however, they will first need to find a competent orthopaedic surgeon to implant a backbone into their collective body politic, a vertebral part which so far they have proved to have sadly lacking in their anatomical constitution.)

We should, however, be very clear about one thing: it will be no use whatsoever for myself and others to continue to wring our hands, wail and gnash our teeth about the lamentable, narcissistic and self-serving behaviour of the Caliph of Camden (otherwise known as the Emperor with no clothes) as the pseudo-leader of the Bermuda community. He will not mind our collective outcry in the least bit. Indeed, he depends on it – so long as that is all it is: hot air blowing off. (Remember his "It too shall pass" comment (The Royal Gazette, June 13) about how he anticipated the reaction of a "firestorm" to his decision to bring the four Uighurs to Bermuda?)

Janice Battersbee is right: in order for real change to take place, there has to be continued and sustained and vociferous opposition to the Caliph of Camden, from the people, from his party and from his political opponents. But with that there also needs to be a commitment ultimately to take collective action to unseat him by withdrawing political support for him – kicking the throne out from under him, as it were. The power of the boot against backside is, in the end, the only effective means to bring about change in this situation.

This popinjay of a panjandrum's pseudo-leadership is designed to keep him in power by dividing the people of Bermuda (largely, I would say, against their natural inclination), rather than by building a more integrated, peaceful and happier community grounded on the foundations of Bermuda's increasingly rich diversity as a true leader would inspire.

THE GWELLY RISING

London, UK

Thanks for the support

August 12, 2009

Dear Sir,

May I take this opportunity on behalf of myself as chairman and my fellow trustees of the Horses and Ponies Protection Association (www.happa.org.uk) based in the UK to say a sincere thank you to all of your readers who so kindly and generously sponsored my daughter-in-law, Audrey Cranage, who is a senior nurse at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital in Bermuda and her very good friend Nicky Sykes of the UK, and raised funds for our organisation.

Both ladies successfully completed the 177 miles of the Offa's Dyke Walk between Monmouth and Pretatyn, which is considered to be one of the hardest walks in the UK, parts of which are used in the training of the British SAS and Royal Marines, and raised almost £4,000 to help abandoned, neglected and abused horses, ponies and donkeys.

My wife and I will be visiting your beautiful island once again in spring, 2010 when I look forward to thanking the sponsors personally.

KEN CRANAGE

HAPPA Chairman

Burnley, UK

Great Wall of Warwick

August 19, 2009

Dear Sir,

Has everyone seen the great Wall of Bermuda/China at Middle Road near Belmont.

It'll be completed one day. Rome wasn't built in a day either.

I love Bermuda — Feel the love.

LC O'TOOLE

Warwick