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Minister of People Empowerment and Elder Affairs, Cynthia Forde.

Avoid taking bribes, young politicians told

Young politicians in Barbados have been encouraged to walk the straight and narrow path and avoid taking bribes in order to get rich quickly.

Minister of People Empowerment and Elder Affairs, Cynthia Forde, who is the Member of Parliament for St. Thomas, gave this critical piece of advice as she made her contribution to debate on the Integrity in Public Life Bill, 2018 which took place in Parliament this week.

“You must think through what will be the repercussions of us as politicians taking things from people, and I would say taking bribes, because a lot of politicians will be targeted. And I want to encourage my young colleagues here and all those young people out there who want to become politicians or leaders in this country, do not let anybody take away that pride you would have had, by bribing you to do something that you know you should not do,” she admonished.

“We must develop strong, honest, upright Barbadians as of that vintage who were extremely poor, but they were steeped in Bible sayings and policies and standards and they did what was right, every time. They have become the senior citizens who we see nowadays as centenarians who have worked hard and long in the hot boiling son, in the rain, in the fields and the hills to build this society, and now in their olden days they are suffering because people who were in positions to be able to assist them in this time, have taken away the government’s money, have taken away the money from the corporate sector and so on and have created a ripple effect of challenges that are destroying the lives of our people,” Forde continued.

She said, “Too many of us in this country and in the world want to get rich or die trying. So we will take any chance to get whatever it is in our hands…cars and houses and land and money as bribes, and then there is something…called when the thing hits the fan, we are scrambling, we want to leave Barbados never to come to back or we go overseas and can never come back, because we are found in a court of law in those countries.

It does not make sense when we can work hard.”
(RSM)

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