The Tribune

ALTHOUGH Prime Minister Christie and National Security Minister Nottage have agreed to meet with the Police Staff Association to discuss compensation for the 12-hour shifts that police were assigned to combat escalating crime, comments made in October by Minister of State for National Security Keith Bell keep surfacing.

At the end of October, Mr Bell stated that the Police Staff Association (PSA) – which has been agitating for some form of compensation for their men’s extra hours — “has always been a tool of the Free National Movement”. Apparently, Mr Bell went further in a TV interview when he claimed that the FNM had established the PSA to get rid of then Commissioner BK Bonaby. Although we have asked persons who should know whether there was any truth to this assertion about Mr Bonaby, we can find no one who knows anything about it. In fact, it has been denied. Mr Bonaby died in March this year and was given a full military funeral.

Despite former Assistant Commissioner Paul Thompson — considered the moving spirit behind the establishment of the PSA — denying Mr Bell’s statements, the rumour persists that the PSA is a political tool of the Opposition.

It’s unfortunate that Mr Bell appears to be trying to smear the PSA with that label. However, it certainly was not the place of Security Minister Bernard Nottage to be the one to announce that government was putting the Police Force on 12-hour shifts to combat crime. This was a political move in an attempt to assure an already nervous public that the government was determined to get crime under control. Of course, one of the planks in the PLP’s election platform was that if Bahamians entrusted it with the government it had just the right formula to curb crime. It is obvious that this was not so. No one has that formula. It is something that rests solely with the Bahamian people and their decision to work with the police.

The 12-hour shift order should have been made by the Commissioner of Police. But the Minister’s announcement made it appear that it was taken out of the Commissioner’s hands by the politicians. Many in the force resented this.

PSA Staff Association President Dwight Smith did not know why Mr Bell was trying to politicise the PSA’s plea for compensation for its members. “It’s throwing us off the issue of compensation. We are not an FNM tool or a PLP tool,” Mr Smith said. He also noted that he maintains a good relationship with Police Commissioner Ellison Greenslade and that he despises attempts to put a wedge between them. He called the 12-hour shift a “government initiative”, not a “commissioner initiative”.

And so it was — or at least by the Minister’s announcement it certainly appeared to be.

There is nothing new about 12-hour shifts in the Police Force — although at one time when it was in Opposition, the PLP severely criticised the Ingraham government for being insensitive to the welfare of police officers and practising “old fashioned policing”. Now that they are the government, they are playing the old tune, but to a different beat. It is nothing but political hypocrisy.

Twelve-hour shifts for the force goes back as far as anyone can remember. It was a decision made when needed at the sole discretion of the Police Commissioner. In those days everyone did their duty without complaint.

We would suggest to Mr Bell that he read former Assistant Commissioner Paul Thompson’s book – “A Policeman’s Story“ — to understand the history of the force in which he himself served for 23 years. We also recommend to Mr Bell — and to anyone else interested – that he turn to page 51 and read through to page 55 if he wants to know the true story of who and how the PSA was started. Some people should learn their history before they twist the truth for their political convenience.

Mr Thompson was recruited in Trinidad as a young boy for the Bahamas Police Force. As a young man, he became interested in seeing how the living and working conditions of policemen were improved in countries that had a police association – not a union. “In conversations with officers in those countries I learned that staff associations had been able to achieve a great deal not only in conditions of service but in delivery of service to the public,” wrote Mr Thompson.

In the early years, Salathiel Thompson encourage Mr Thompson in his interest in pushing for a PSA. But by 1970, when Mr Thompson had reached the rank of deputy commissioner, he had gone cold on the idea. Paul Thompson was to later learn that the Pindling government did not want the Bahamas force to have a police association.

However, Mr Thompson continued to gather material and seek support in the ranks.

By 1992, there was to be an election and the FNM, under the leadership of Hubert Ingraham had published its “Manifesto ’92”. On page 46 of that Manifesto, a short, innocuous paragraph caught Mr Thompson’s attention. “Encourage and facilitate the formation of a Police Association.”

The FNM won the election, but no more was heard about the facilitation of a police association. Mr Thompson was disappointed. However, his friend Cornelius Smith, had been appointed National Security Minister. Mr Thompson, a police officer, had worked in various investigations with Mr Smith, when the latter was a Customs officer.

“I kept pestering him about a staff association for the police,” wrote Mr Thompson, “and eventually one was established in February 1997” — almost at the end of the FNM’s first term.

And so, Mr Bell, we suggest that before you create any further confusion in an already confused country you read the book and get your facts straight. Then maybe you will have the good grace to once again take to the airwaves and correct your error.