60,000 reasons for McPhee

As of Monday, March 21, 2016

EDITOR, The Tribune.

As Parliamentarians from the FNM and PLP continue to vouchsafe alleged secret plots against high ranking government officials and Save The Bay officials, Mount Calvary Baptist Church Pastor Dr Philip McPhee spoke graciously of Canadian billionaire Peter Nygard, the embattled Lyford Cay resident.

McPhee’s statement to the press that Nygard has the best interest of the Bahamian people at heart is nothing more than an endorsement. This comes at a time when the Canadian fashion designer is currently undergoing a public relations bludgeoning by his detractors. In homiletic fashion, McPhee admonished the daily that interviewed him not to judge Nygard. However, by rendering a value judgment, albeit positive, of Nygard, he did the very thing he warned the newspaper not to do, which was not to judge anyone.

If you recalled, in 2013 McPhee celebrated 23 years of pastoring Mount Calvary, a church he inherited from his father, the late Rev W G McPhee. In attendance at his anniversary service was one Peter Nygard, a man who ‘‘blessed’’ McPhee with $10,000.

As a philanthropist, Nygard had dumped $50,000 into the Independence Day Regatta at Clifton Pier on Independence Day in 2013 – an event which was headed by none other than the Rev McPhee.

Based on my calculations, McPhee has either directly or indirectly been the beneficiary of at least $60,000 from Nygard. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that he would come to his benefactor’s defence. Had Nygard never contributed money to McPhee and his regatta committee, I wonder if the prominent clergyman would have vouched for him.

KEVIN EVANS

Freeport, Grand Bahama

March 17, 2016.