Bahamas Blog

People laugh when I talk about the Bahamian mafia, but it is no joke.

There really is a culture of organized crime in The Bahamas, even if it isn't as organized as in other nations. (I mean, what in The Bahamas works efficiently? Nothing!)

I was reading The Guardian (the real one, in England) and I came across an article by Roberto Mancini on the Italian mafia.

Mancini quotes Piero Ostellino, the former editor and journalist of Il Corriere Della Sera, the most distinguished and conservative of all Italian newspapers. This is how Ostellino describes Italy today, in the preface to his new book Lo stato canaglia (The scoundrel state):

Quote:

A country paralysed by a huge number of laws and regulations, suffocated by an invasive and slow-witted bureaucratic culture; run by a plethoric, costly, inefficient, and often corrupted, civil service; oppressed by punitive fiscal laws for those who pay their taxes and absent-minded towards those who don't; the prisoner of guild or nepotistic interests; from Rome southwards, in the hands of organised crime. A country in a relentless cultural, economic, political decline. This is Italy today.

Sounds like he is talking about The Bahamas, no?

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A new judge will have to resolve the $100 million dispute between feuding Israeli-born brothers Rami and Amir Weissfisch.

The Court Of Appeal ruled that Senior Justice Anita Allen should step down from the case. Justice Allen maintained that she could objectively determine the distribution of profits from 1992 to 2000 of the brother's metal trading business when she decided to remain on the case.

Justice Allen was also critical of the actions of Senior Justice John Lyons in his appointment of Daniel Ferguson - the brother of a close female friend of Lyons - to conduct a forensic accounting report.

Justice Lyons resigned on May 7 following the controversy surrounding the appointment.

During the recusal application, there was a debate whether Justice Allen was the first person to mention recusal during a meeting in her chambers to discuss a newspaper article about the case, which was being held in closed court.

The only person who recorded what transpired during this meeting was Nicholas Lavender, QC, the lawyer for Rami Weisfisch. According to Lavender, Justice Allen first suggested recusing herself after she said she was "conflicted" by information she had heard.

The Court found that in the absence of an objective record of what transpired in the judge's chambers it was not able to say "that the fair-minded and informed observer would not have any doubt about the learned judge's objectivity and we therefore hold that the learned judge ought to have recused herself from further hearing the matter."

From The PUNCH!