“I’M COMING HOME” A HIT SONG FOR INDEPENDENCE
The following is a statement from the voice note of Fred Mitchell, Chairman of the PLP responding to the Organization for Responsible Governance and their claim that the voter turnout in the last general election reflected a disaffection amongst the population on 24 July 2026:
Many Bahamians have become entranced, and I am one of them. by the short videos of TikTok, and I’ve discovered that it is a window into the life of young Bahamians, a generation that I lead, but they were born and live in another world than the one into which I was born. The line from the song by Louis Armstrong is apt here. They’ll know much more than I’ll ever know.
I’m jealous of that fact, but life is what it is. So what is instructive, is a number of young men, some with dread locks, some bald, some unplaited, some who are clean shaven, who use the platform to have fun with themselves, and in doing so exemplify what the musician Pat Rahming has described culture as “the way we live”. The Bahamian language is used freely without let or hindrance. There is a lot of cursing, and what I marked down in the dialogue is crude language, shouting and incivility, but it seems to me that for that generation, they don’t see that as incivility at all.
And then they switch into Standard English. Fast forward to another set of cameos. I’m told she’s a teacher and it’s under the rubric Relatable Bahamas network. I don’t know her name, but as an artist, producer, writer, she’s brilliant.
She captures the essence of the incivility in our service culture and the irony of the complaints we all make with service, and the way we then treat those we serve. She captures this brilliantly.
There is one about the service of the banks and another applying for service at a government office. KB the musician wrote in another time singing about the issue when he said: “Who gave you this job?”
My MP was the reply. “When you come into work? Anytime.”
Three years ago, the writer Outten from Grand Bahama sand these words:” Nassau is the capital– Bahamas 1973. We were free.”
It was a big hit without commissioning or asking. It captured the essence of what we felt on our fiftieth anniversary.
This year, the musician Nelson ‘Sourcegood 242’ Louis ( pictured above), a new musicians, as far as I can tell, came up with a song that expresses the way folks feel about US immigration policy, and the way CARICOM nationals and Bahamians are treated in a manner that no one in government would or could dare express.
“I’m coming home.” He says tell ice to buy his ticket. He’s not from no state. He’s coming home. It is brilliant stuff. So why the reprise?
I have a problem because the Organisation for Responsible Governance revealed what they say in the press was a summary of focus groups. They say, apathy and lack of trust and dissatisfaction is rife with our institutions among Bahamians, and they say this was reflected by the turnout in the general election. I can’t speak for their empirical data, but I don’t believe for one minute Bahamians are apathetic about this country and its institutions or disengaged or disaffected.
We are a maturing democracy, and the turnout is a reflection of that fact, nothing else. However, the examples I gave freely show that people are very much engaged. So ORG please, let’s stop the doom and gloom.
End