A little too late and an exercise in futility. That was how one man described the protest action against Paul Doyle and his hotel at Crane Beach yesterday.
“I come out just to show my support, but more should have been done at an earlier stage. We shouldn’t wait until everything was almost settled and then start,” Ras Martin declared.
Speaking as he held a billowing Lion of Judah flag in the stiff afternoon breeze, Ras Martin said while he was there to support his “brethren” Neville Best (whose chairs were locked away in the dispute), protests should have been held when the situation first came to a head.
“I think this protest is a little too late. I think when they had the chairs locked down, that we should have done something to show Mr Doyle that we could interrupt his income as well,” the Rastafarian said.
The lifelong St Philip resident said when the dispute was at its highest, protesters should have been preventing the trucks, which were carrying concrete slabs for the construction of a new building, from entering the hotel.
“We should have blocked all of that peacefully. But this, right now, to me, is like an exercise in futility.”
Joy Workman, who was also taking part in the protest, said it was time for Government to take a stand “collectively”.
“Government’s voice has to come out and state strongly, very clearly, that whatever rules and regulations are in place, there should be no tensions for Barbadians from all walks of life to feel free to come to any beach,” she noted.
Also attending was political leader of the Barbados Integrity Movement, Neil Holder, who wasn’t just throwing his support behind the protest – he firmly believed that no Barbadian beach should be private.
“While you are coming here to invest we have no objection to that, but we still have to be cognizant that each and every Barbadian has a right to the spaces that are provided for them.
“So I have no objection to ensuring that we do not privatise any beach and that, at the end of the day, every beach is accessible to our citizens,” he said. (HLE)
