The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

PROGRESSIVE Liberal Party (PLP) Minister of State for National Security Keith Bell's behaviour in recent times continues to befuddle me.

It's been a month now since the PLP defeated former Prime Minister Hubert A Ingraham and his Free National Movement (FNM) at the polls, yet the government senator carries on as if the country is set to go to the polls again in a few days.

In the June 11 edition of The Nassau Guardian, a front page article appeared with Mr Bell accusing the former Ingraham administration of bribing voters by handing out cash on Election Day in Centreville.

Bell said that he saw FNM operatives handing out white envelopes to the residents of that area. According to Bell, the envelopes contained $250 in Bahamian denominations. I will not swear for the FNM or its leadership.

The opposition party has a well oiled public relations machinery that can respond to this latest allegation by Mr Bell.

I find it interesting that the former governing party would attempt to bride voters in a constituency in which its standard bearer for that area, Ella Lewis, didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of winning against the then Opposition Leader, Perry G Christie.

Christie crushed Lewis at the polls by well over 1,300 votes.

So if Bell is telling the truth, the FNM had wasted plenty money in a constituency it had no chance of winning.

Assuming that Bell is telling truth, this can probably explain why the FNM has run into financial difficulties.

Still, I am willing to give the leadership of the FNM the benefit of the doubt.

Besides, the former prime minister himself had also accused the PLP of buying votes. Seems like Peter is no better than Paul with respect to vote buying.

I cannot figure out Bell, though. It was only recently that he stood up in the Upper Chamber and lambasted the former Ingraham administration for allegedly dismantling urban renewal and the witness protection programme.

Bell seems to be hell-bent on making himself as odious as he possibly can to the members of the opposition party by levelling charges against them every other week.

In the Nassau Guardian article, Bell pointed out in a letter that was sent to the Commissioner of Police Ellison Greenslade that he had served as vice-chairman and national campaign coordinator for the PLP in the recent general election held on May 7.

According to the letter, Bell asked the commissioner to launch an investigation into the "use of a certain sector of the plain clothes branch of the Royal Bahamas Police Force as a means to facilitate corrupt and unethical practices perpetrated by certain operatives of the Free National Movement".

If an investigation is held and evidence is discovered that the former Ingraham administration did indeed purchased votes, will any of the former FNM cabinet ministers and the former prime minister be hauled before the courts and charged?

Frankly, I believe that the minister of state for national security is simply bluffing the opposition party and the media.

The PLP had called for the nation to heal after the divisive general election. No doubt many FNM supporters are still recovering from the devastating loss that their party had suffered on May 7.

But individuals like Bell continue to pull the scab off the wound inflicted by the PLP on FNMs. Bell thrives on being in an attack mode.

Seems as if he has yet to realise that he is now in government. Bell is carrying on as if he is a member of an opposition party. He needs to get out of his campaign mode and start acting like a government minister. The elections are over. Even Prime Minister Christie and PLP Chairman Bradley Roberts are not as radical in their opposition to the FNM as Bell. He needs to be more even-tempered. Bell's over-the-top, radical partisanship is way too scary for me. He needs to focus his attention on getting this murder crisis in Nassau under control and stop picking fights with the FNM. But I am beginning to suspect that Bell has no answer on hand to deal with the unprecedented crime wave that is destroying the capital. That is why he is wasting valuable time in accusing the FNM every other week. Even the revelation about him and the substantive Minister of National Security Dr Bernard Nottage being armed with hand guns sparked a brouhaha in the press. Bell seems to relish being in the spotlight.

I believe Bell is trying to divert the Bahamian people's attention away from his performance as minister of state for national security. Since May 7, there have been about 22 murders under his watch.

Yet Bell continues to get caught up in these senseless domestic spats with the FNM. I am calling on Prime Minister Christie to pull his junior minister aside and tell him to focus his energy on fixing the crime situation. God willing, when the next election cycle comes around, Bell can once again campaign for the PLP as their national campaign coordinator. He seems to love to doing that.

THE SQUEALER

Nassau,

June 11, 2012.