Sealy: Slogan an embarrassment

FORMER MINISTER OF TOURISM Richard Sealy is charging that the suggestions to replace the controversial slogan Little Island, Big Barbados, have been shelved because they are embarrassing.

Sealy was speaking as a guest of Just Politics: Our Worldview, on Facebook on Sunday, and he lambasted the current administration for an embarrassing tourism sector, taking special aim at the failed slogan.

He said that the Government paid $700 000 to an overseas entity for the slogan and didn’t think to Google it before the big reveal. Since then, Government had tasked a new committee, headed by Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, Vice-Chancellor of The University of the West Indies to come up with a new slogan.

“The reason why the new committee has not reported is because what they came up with has been put on a shelf. It is embarrassing. Sir Hilary Beckles is a brilliant historian, he is a very capable university administrator, phenomenal thinker, writer [and] academic, but he is not a sloganeer, he is not a marketer, he is not a tourism person,” he said.

While he acknowledged there were things out of the officials’ control, Sealy said from where he was sitting he got the impression there was no real plan for the sector.

Sealy said the reboot committee came up with three alternatives; “ It’s A Bajan Thing”; “ Live Like A Bajan” and “ Barbados: Feel Free.

“They could well as keep Little Island, Big Smile. Is that really what those 18 people came up with? It is an embarrassment! What is going on in tourism in Barbados? The crap that is coming out of that ministry; I don’t understand it. No wonder you’re not hearing anything about it. That’s on a shelf somewhere sitting down. They are so embarrassed by it. This can’t continue!” he declared.

Real challenges

He noted the pandemic had thrown up real challenges for the country, but said other people had been getting on with their business.

“We have one of the best stretches of beach and hotel property in Barbados, breeding rats and roaches, just north of Speightstown because the Government decide to go to war with Sandals over some foolishness. We brought them here so they gotta play politics with it. [Sandals] are building three hotels in Jamaica, one in St Vincent, upgrading the hotel in Turks and Caicos, Cayman Islands got hotels building and Barbados nothing, no foreign direct investment,” he stated.

Sealy said as a result the construction jobs and the chance to get 2 000 permanent jobs had been lost.

“You know what that would do for the economy in St Peter? It’s sitting idle. We have to get serious about this thing and stop playing the politics. It is something, frankly speaking, that people like myself would get passionate about,” he said.

While he said he was not trying to be harsh, Sealy said plans needed to be put in place to revive the tourism sector.

“We moved from 6 000 to 7 000 rooms that were breaking records for arrivals by 2018. We should be moving now. Given COVID, we should be trying to get the room stock out, because obviously with the pent up demand it is going to be a bonanza eventually. The question is how Barbados will benefit from that, because we need tourism.

“The reality is what’s going on in Barbados is not sustainable. You cannot borrow your way out of a crisis. The same way the then Leader of the Opposition was so articulate, you cannot tax your way out of a crisis. Now that she is Minister of Finance, and you cannot borrow your way out of it. You have to earn your way out of it,” he said. ( RA)

FORMER MINISTER OF TOURISM RICHARD SEALY. (FP)