Not surprising, when election time comes around a candidate will want to distance himself from someone who by association will not help his cause.

West Bay MLA, and Cayman’s Tourism Minister, Cline Glidden, who had been elected over his last two terms on the tailcoats of his leader, ex-premier McKeeva Bush, finds himself in unfamiliar territory. His running mate, deputy premier, Rolston Anglin, is in the same position.

So, Glidden delivered many revelations to the 200 plus crowd gathered in a West Bay residential yard last Tuesday (23) to open the PNA’s fight in the district, carefully painting a picture of pitch black against his former leader and leaving himself the whiter shade of pale.

Glidden maintained that it was Bush’s insistence of continuing with his China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) cruise ship deal that had caused the cruise association to announce a drop in port calls to Cayman.

He said it was during his first meeting as tourism minster with the Florida Caribbean Cruise Association (FCAA) they told him that Bush, when he presented them with the CHEC proposal, had said the cruise lines had to pay $37 per passenger to use the new dock. The FCCA said this was too high.

As a result the FCAA had to reconsider Cayman as a cruise destination but despite this Bush still guaranteed the minimum passenger fee to the Chinese. With the FCCA not agreeing to this cost the make up would have had to come from the public purse.

Glidden said the deal he had been negotiating with, GLF, was a much better deal than CHEC’s and many in the UDP party thought so too, but Bush had threatened to resign if his party had not “yielded to his will”.

So why hadn’t Glidden resigned instead and told us all this then? All he did was distance himself from the cruise ship port negotiations.

More revelations from Glidden followed.

Bush signed the CHEC deal without the knowledge of the board, except for the chairman, John Henry Ebanks, who was also the only person who had seen the framework agreement with CHEC. None of the government lawyers had been privy to it and neither the UK advisor sent by the FCO to assist with the port talks.

Even though Bush has insisted that this was only a draft agreement, Glidden said there was no indication on the document that it was a draft and Bush’s signature is on every page.

When Bush engaged local Quantity Surveyor, Alastair Patterson, at $15,000 per month, it was AFTER Bush had signed the framework agreement.

So, this was just a ruse by Bush to falsely indicate that he was still in negotiations with the Chinese?

And Bush’s cabinet said nothing?

Glidden announced that the first part of the construction of the cruise ship piers would have required around 400 workers, but Bush had signed a guarantee for 300 Chinese work permits!

Perhaps Ellio Solomon, who took over as head negotiator for Bush, can explain that one? Ever since he took over his mouth has been moving up and down telling us that the huge majority of the port work will be done by Caymanians! It was guaranteed!

Glidden has promised us more revelations. I can hardly wait.