This Opera Telecom situation is very simple folks…
1/ A company called Opera Telecom advertised a game of chance called “Lucky Numbers” on the Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation and the Nation Newspaper. The company made millions in Barbados and other jurisdictions by charging a dollar or two to enter the contest and then never bothering to award prizes.
2/ No list of winners was ever published. The winning “Lucky Number” remained the same for so long that it was obvious the company wasn’t even bothering to pretend it was legitimate. There is no doubt that Opera Telecom’s “Lucky Number” contest was a widespread consumer fraud.
3/ For almost a year, the Barbados Government and the advertisers have known that this is a consumer fraud, yet the media continued to advertise the contest and the government refused to enforce the law.
4/ Both the Barbados Government and the Barbados media have profited from the consumer fraud through taxes and advertising revenues.
5/ As our friends at Barbados Underground so accurately put it (even if a little coarse)… the authorities in Barbados allow Opera Telecom to piss on our rules and regulations. We would go one further and say that both the current and past governments and the Barbados media are happy to piss on citizens if they can put money in their pockets.
Somebody big in government and the Barbados media must have received “gifts”. That’s the only way that Opera Telecom could have so publicly pissed on our country for so long.
Will Prime Minister Thompson actually do anything about it?
Not a bloody chance. Just watch – same old, same old ’bout hey.
David over at Barbados Underground has the latest in this continuing government-sponsored consumer fraud. See his articles…
May 19, 2008 – Opera Telecom, Cable & Wireless Limited, Fair Trading Commission And Foolishness
November 13, 2007 – Authorities In Barbados Allow Opera Telecom To Piss On Our Rules & Regulations ~ Where Is Minister Lynette Eastmond?
6 Comments
May 21, 2008 at 1:11 am
“We are not an enforcement culture”
Read: we are lazy bastards.
It tek hard wuk and sweat to enforce.
Too much bodderation!
Dey safe,man!
Nothing will be done.
The Police have bigger fish to fry.
Call us when it’s something important.
May 21, 2008 at 12:53 pm
all this does is confirm that Thompy and co. is now on the take – otherwise how could he not stop this obvious fraud on the people of Barbados?
May 21, 2008 at 4:00 pm
Thompy and newly elected members may already be on the take but the other possibility or factor is that they are mere puppets of the civil servants and have no real power to affect immediate change without fierce objections or manipulations by those employed to carry out their instructions.
Errol Barrow described some of them as an “army in occupation”
Thompy needs to insist on ITAL and clean house of some of these people if he is to get anywhere. The others will then fall into line or face the same fate.
If they are doing their job well then promote them.
May 21, 2008 at 6:22 pm
Thompy doesn’t want ITAL because it would apply to him too, not only the civil servants.
May 23, 2008 at 7:12 pm
It was 10 mins. to 3 p.m. when I started calling Min. of Foreign Affairs on Friday p.m.
Silly boy!
Dem weekend done start, boy!
I phoned 431-2200.
Rang off the hook for about 2 mins.
(just to see)
431-2201
another 2 mins. of my life.
431-2202
There went a third minute
Finally someone answered 431-2203
and I spoke to someone who put me thru.
They must have been having a very busy Friday afternoon, up there!
It was 5 mins. to 3 p.m. when I was finished.
weekeeeeend!
July 24, 2008 at 5:49 am
[...] this by revisiting the Opera Interactive Barbados Limited issue first raised by Adrian Loveridge on Barbados Free Press and BU in September 2007. The BU family may recall that there was the concern that the company [...]