The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

Tall Pines MP Leslie Miller recently said in the House of Assembly that web shop owners are Bahamians who have made the country proud. He said also that they should not be degraded or compared to organised criminals or gangsters.

The numbers men have made millions of dollars because the odds are heavily stacked in their favour. If that wasn’t the case, then they would not have been in the industry to begin with.

When Miller said this small group of individuals have made the country proud, it all depends on which segment of the country he is referring to.

At the other end of the spectrum are the thousands of poor Bahamians who have squandered millions of their hard earned dollars in an effort to improve their economic lot.

The web shop industry represents the greatest transfer of wealth from the poor to the numbers men whom Miller said we should be proud of.

I challenge Miller to show me at least 100 Bahamians who have benefitted significantly from web shop gaming.

He would be hard-pressed to find just one person who has benefited as much as any of the web shop operators he is so proud of.

From what I read in a Nassau Guardian article, the Tall Pines MP’s statement was a response to a Free National Movement (FNM) MP who called the numbers men organised criminals.

While the FNM MP may have sounded harsh in his judgment, he was telling the truth.

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s glossary web site, organised crime is defined as any group having some manner of a formalised structure and whose primary objective is to obtain money through illegal activities.

Isn’t this what the numbers men are doing by breaking the law? Their businesses are highly structured and illegal.

And so we can see that, technically speaking, web shop owners are organised criminals, notwithstanding Miller’s assertion. Why is this even a debate?

Perhaps the term ‘‘organised criminals’’ conjures up in the mind of Miller images of Al Capone, Joe Masseria, Salvatore Maranzano, Charlie ‘‘Lucky’’ Luciano and other bloodthirsty mob bosses who operated multimillion dollar rackets.

No one is suggesting that web shop operators have gone to that extent. And besides, whether or not the term is appropriate to use is missing the point.

All are agreed that web shop operators continue to defy the state with breathtaking impunity.

And now we have lawmakers standing up in the House of Assembly in order to defend them while many parliamentarians and law enforcement officials are scratching their heads and wondering why so many young men are opting for a career in crime.

Something has to be seriously wrong with this country.

Now I see why we are headed down to hell in a hand basket.

In the final analysis, Miller’s defense of the numbers men was highly inappropriate as it sends the message to young impressionable minds that it is okay to break the laws of The Bahamas.

And no, Bahamians should not be proud of web shop owners or any other person who is a lawbreaker for that matter.

Rather than applaud a group of wealthy individuals who are chronic lawbreakers, why not instead applaud the thousands of ordinary hard-working and law-abiding citizens who have made The Bahamas a great country?

KEVIN EVANS

Freeport, Grand Bahama,

November 15, 2013.