The Tribune

WHILE the Swires (Cathay Pacific) group was negotiating with the Bahamas government to take over Bahamas Airways, which was a subsidiary of BOAC, another airline company was being incorporated in the chambers of Lynden Pindling and Kendal Nottage. The date was March 13, 1968.

Although Sir Lynden had become prime minister the year before, and should not have been involved in his law firm, he told the 1984 Commission of Inquiry into drugs that “he caused this company to be incorporated (in his firm) and during the year that followed (by now he was into his second year as prime minister) he researched and made preparation for establishing an international airline.” His buddy, Everette Bannister, became president of this airline in January 1970. And so Bahamas World Airlines Ltd, a paper airline with mysterious New York backers, was born. It had great ambitions.

Meanwhile the Bahamas government had negotiated with Swires to operate Bahamas Airways for the Bahamian people with certain exclusive routes, which included New York, Jamaica and Cancun. Apparently government’s negotiators were unaware of the backroom shenanigans going on with Bannister’s group, which were coveting the same routes.

If Sir Lynden were aware of the code of ethics in the airline business, which became an issue in 1964 when Bahamas Airway’s chairman, who was also a member of BOAC’s board, objected to Pan-American World Airways (BAL) being given permission to carry passengers between Nassau and Rock Sound, Eleuthera, in competition with the local airline, he would have known that the Bannister airline and Swires-owned BAL could not co-exist. BOAC said it would have been a heavy financial burden on Bahamas Airways, which had spent a great deal of money developing domestic routes, to compete with PanAm. It was unusual, he said, for a country not to protect its own airline. After negotiations in London with BOAC it was decided that Bahamas Airways would give up the Eleuthera-Nassau route and PanAm would take it over.

That was 1964. We now move on to Saturday, October 1970 when The Tribune announced: “Bahamas Airways — Flag carrier of the Bahamas — was not flying flags today. It ceased all operations at 6pm yesterday when its negotiations to get the Government of the Bahamas to buy 51 per cent of the equity in the company broke down.” Under another headline, it was announced: “Bahamas Airways (BAL) went into liquidation at 10 o’clock this morning.” Overnight 800 shocked airline staff were jobless.

One staff member told how she had been instructed to call Turks Island to tell the airport staff there not to get the tanker out that morning as the BAL aircraft would not be arriving. As she gave instructions to Turks Island, a letter was slipped into her hand. She was in shock when she opened the envelope and discovered that that telephone call on behalf of BAL would be her last. She was out of a job.

All hell broke out in the House of Assembly with PLPs attacking their government, one of them — former Transport Minister Warren Levarity — who had negotiated the agreement with Swires not only felt that Swires had been doubled crossed, but so had he.

Mr Levarity, PLP representative for Killarney, who had by now been removed as a cabinet minister, said that Swires had made it known to government during their talks that it expected and was fully prepared to take the loss of $5 million per year for the first two years and that it did not anticipate it would make any money until it initiated its New York service.

Although the government, said Mr Levarity, was not prepared to participate in BAL until it became a money-making proposition, “it agreed to this monopoly by BAL because of the tremendous amount of money being put into the operation.”

“In 1969, however,” said an angry Mr Levarity, “a paper company — Bahamas World Transport — with no aircraft, no airline and no financial stability or anything, was granted a license by the Air Transport Licensing Authority to fly over the same routes being sought by Bahamas Airways.”

What this meant, said Mr Levarity, was that “BAL could no longer trust the word of the Bahamas government.”

Because Mr Levarity started to inquire into what was going on behind the scenes, and was not “prepared to give any airline a license to go and sell it to somebody else at the expense of a legitimate agreement we had with BAL,” he was sacked by Sir Lynden from his ministerial post. The BAL matter was taken out of his hands.

“BAL, which had already sunk $25 million into the airline, knew it couldn’t trust the word of government. That’s why they pulled out,” Mr Levarity said.

It was only because of this, said Mr Levarity, that there were hundreds of people and those in allied services, who were unemployed.

“Government was not prepared to honour its own word. As long as this continues, no one will be prepared to put their money into this country if you are going to say one thing today and change it tomorrow.”

There was no reason for these hundreds of people to be sacrificed for “some people’s interests which are not in the best interests of our country,” said Mr Levarity.

This reminds us so much of what is now projected for BTC that we advise Prime Minister Christie to think again before he interferes with the Cable & Wireless agreement and this country’s promising telecommunications future. If BTC staff want a secure future, and do not want to find themselves in the same position as still bitter former BAL staff, they will make their voices heard now. We only have to look at the bankrupt airline called Bahamasair to know what the future of BTC might be should Cable & Wireless give up on a country whose contracts seem to be meaningless.