A tragedy on the rooftop

Sun, January 15, 2012 - 12:00 AM

EVERY PROUD Barbadian should be outraged this morning. For so sooner had we reaped the benefits of long years of lobbying for World Heritage Site status than, it seems, the philistine hand was hard at work.

There it was tampering and occluding an ancient landmark of our heritage, and endangering that which we fought so hard to achieve.

The Nicholls Building on the eastern corner of Prince William Henry Street and James Street is part of the tradition of our capital, and its distinctive architecture, capped by a historically instructive Dutch roof line, deserves the integrity and dignity the oldest structure in any main city is worthy of.

Alas, in the past week this historical landmark has been savaged in a manner that defies appreciation of what benefits can accrue to our country from the proper exploitation of our status as a World Heritage Site.

We cannot help but question in stupefaction who could have authorized and organized these indecent alterations to the Nicholls Building without care for the fact that it is one of the first in our capital. And, that this can so quietly and swiftly happen suggests we need more protection regulation, that we no longer destroy – wittingly or unwittingly – those monuments and buildings that are the foundation of our history and heritage.

The irony of this latest act of cultural desecration is that it occurs during the time when we are celebrating the 350th anniversary of the signing of the Charter Of Barbados at Oistins on January 11, 1652. This very important event marks our country down as one of the first in this hemisphere to make its mark as a citadel of democracy.

That the treaty was signed not in Bridgetown but at Oistins may owe more to historical accident than to any notion democratic principles were confined to any one part of the island.

The preservation of our historical culture must be a widespread appreciation among our people – not among just a few. We must all be part of the drive to secure our heritage; and a thousand eyes and ears will do much more to police and maintain it than the most efficient Government regulator.

A stone’s throw away from the Nicholls Building is a car park.

This spot up to the early 1970s carried several buildings, among which was Codd’s House, the first site of this country’s Parliament. It was needlessly bulldozed, under official authority, to make way for a new Supreme Court, which never materialized.

What sacrilege!

This latest atrocity with the Nicholls Building must now stare the authorities in the face. We hope regulations will be put in place soonest to prevent the acultural modification of buildings where they represent a significant part of our heritage.

We have developed the various niches in our tourism product in the hope of luring to our shores those members of particular affinity groups, whose interests might be aroused by an ancient, religious temple, or our slave huts, or our first Parliament Buildings, or our caves – whether subterranean or of the Animal Flower variety.

We should not desecrate further the Nicholls Building, and the philistine hand must be kept away from other hallowed structures, if we wish to preserve our status as a World Heritage Site.

We accept that the Nicholls Building is private; but if any building has such historical and cultural significance, it must fall within the mechanism that allows the authorities to know what is being contemplated for it before it happens!

The alteration of that Dutch landmark roof is a tragedy which should have been and, we believe, could have been avoided. Our heritage is much too important to permit this again.