The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Judicial Review challenge to Bimini’s controversial cruise ship dock “lives to fight another day”, after the Court of Appeal yesterday granted its environmental backers a seven-day extension in which to file their appeal against the initial Supreme Court ruling.

The appellate court also stayed an Unless Order issued by Justice Hartman Longley on February 14, which mandated that unless the Bimini Blue Coalition paid the collective $650,000 security for costs to the Government and Resorts World Bimini by 4pm today, the Judicial Review action would be completely dismissed.

Such an outcome, though, has been prevented until March 25, 2014, when the Bimini Blue Coalition’s appeal against the security for costs Order is set to be heard by the Court of Appeal.

Fred Smith QC, the Callenders & Co attorney and partner, who witnessed developments in the Court of Appeal yesterday, said: “Bimini Blue Coalition lives to fight another day.

“As an advocate for public law litigation, and hearing of Judicial Review cases to hold the Government accountable, I am very pleased with this favourable decision giving Bimini Blue Coalition the opportunity to argue issues of quantum.”

Mr Smith’s Callenders colleague, Courtney Pearce, and Romauld Ferreira represented the Bimini Blue Coalition before the Court of Appeal. Resorts World Bimini/Genting was represented by McKinney, Bancroft & Hughes, and the Government by the Attorney General.

The prominent QC added: “It takes great courage for grassroots community organisations to launch actions in the Bahamas, given the political and social environment.

“The issues in Bimini are fundamental to regulation and orderly development of the Bahamas, and of great importance to not only Bimini but all other developments in the Bahamas.

“Save the Bays applauds Bimini Blue Coalition for pursuing and seeking to protect their rights. Hopefully, this will embolden other grassroots organisations to do likewise. The time has come where the Bahamas is no longer the Wild West development show.”

Mr Ferreira, in an interview with Tribune Business last week, warned that Justice Longley’s initial ‘security for costs’ ruling had “far-reaching implications” for all public interest-style litigation brought by environmental and other community-based organisations.

He argued that the $650,000 that Bimini Blue Coalition had been ordered to pay “sets the bar so high” for such groups, which often lack the developer’s deep pockets, and threatened to knock their actions out before even reaching the substantive aspects of the litigation.

“This has far-reaching implications for what community-based environmental organisations can do to stand up for the rights of local citizens,” Mr Ferreira told Tribune Business of the Supreme Court verdict.

“It’s undeniable there’s a strong public interest element in relation to this.”

In its written arguments as to why it should get an extension of time, and the Unless Order stayed, Bimini Blue Coalition said the security for costs demand had “the direct effect of....... preventing its serious and well-founded concerns, raised in good faith and in the public interest, from being heard and investigated”.

Arguing that this had set “a precedent” in “preventing public interest associations from bringing Judicial Review challenges”, Bimini Blue Coalition said its action was brought to protect the public, not advance its own interest.`

Instead, it was designed to “protect the environment at Bimini Bay, and to ensure that legislation passed in the Bahamas to protect Crown Land, the natural resources of the Bahamas and the right of Bahamians to take part in decision-making on these matters is enforced and adhered to”.

DeAnka Edwards, an employee in Mr Ferreira’s office, alleged in an affidavit: “The Supreme Court action was brought in the public interest to raise, and have investigated and determined, [Bimini Blue’s] legitimate and well-founded concerns regarding the construction by the developers, seemingly without all of the necessary permits, leases or approvals, of a 1,000 foot pier, ferry terminal and man-made island (using 220,000 cubic yards of material dredged from the seabed) in the face of an Environmental Impact Assessment that identifies serious and irreversible environmental implications, and that makes various recommendations that have been ignored by the developers.”