Letter to the Editor

Outsiders should not be regarded as the enemy

Thursday, January 29, 2004

Dear Sir,

Please allow me some space in your newspaper to express a few opinions. I must say that I am neither Caymanian nor resident of the Cayman Islands. I am Jamaican who has been aware of the numerous controversial affairs that have taken place in the Cayman Islands.

I am happy that the Honourable Mackeeva Bush has seen it necessary to speed up this process of 'status', to the recipients who have contributed years of hard work and committed most of their lives to the building of the Cayman Islands. 

I first came to The Cayman Islands as a visitor in the summer of 2001 when I was on break from university and subsequently have returned about four times.

It is this that made me aware of the situation that many people in The Cayman Islands faced. Let us think for a second, of all the people who would oppose the status grants or those who opposed it. My question to you is, why?

I know that many Jamaicans, for example, have made the Cayman Islands their home, many have worked in positions that many people see as unfitting to them, however many hard working Jamaicans occupied these 'unfitting' positions for years while contributing to the social rearing of the now young Caymanian population. Many others have contributed to the financial sector, and law as well as building enviable entrepreneurial enterprises.

The fact of the matter is this, the Cayman Islands Bar Association should not even be seeking to prove that some of the status grants made were unconstitutional, what they should be concentrating on, is mending a society that for years had been extremely xenophobic and made to look at outsiders as the enemy.

I like the Cayman Islands, after all Cayman is a Caribbean country and so as a concerned Caribbean youth, I am happy that there is a will to move the Cayman Islands forward and that the leaders of the islands have realised that countries are interdependent on other countries, as well as interdependent on people.

Orlando Grant
Tampa, Florida

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