The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

DR ELLISTON Rahming’s failure to be appointed as Bahamian ambassador to the US last year resulted from another “low standard” report that ranks alongside the controversial Investment Climate document, a leading businessman has charged.

Franklyn Wilson, the Arawak Homes chairman, told The Tribune that an “unfair and unprofessional” report produced by an individual he singled out in the US Embassy in Nassau prevented Dr Rahming becoming this nation’s top diplomat in Washington.

While not identifying the US official involved, Mr Wilson said he was personally warned by US congressmen – based on direct information they obtained from the White House – that the official was so steeped in right-wing ideology that he would have “little reservation” writing such a report on Dr Rahming.

Mr Wilson used the example of what befell Dr Rahming to show that the US State Department’s Investment Climate report, which criticised the Bahamas’ public procurement process for a lack of transparency and “undue government interference”, was “not the first time the US have done things like this that reflect low standards”.

His comments are likely to infuriate Washington and the US Embassy, and provide a new angle to potentially widen a diplomatic rift already in existence via the Investment Climate report and the recent claims about eavesdropping/recording of all Bahamian cell phone calls by the National Security Agency.

Mr Wilson disclosed that Mr Rahming’s US ambassador appointment went nowhere after a critical report was written by an Embassy official following the death of an American prisoner when he was superintendent of Her Majesty’s Prison.

“The issue was a prisoner, an American involved in a matter before our courts, died while under the supervision and custodianship of Elliston Rahming as prison superintendent,” Mr Wilson revealed.

“The fact is that Elliston Rahming, as head of the prison, did what the courts said and let this man see a doctor. He took him to the prison doctor. A person in the US Embassy held that against Elliston Rahming, because he thought he had an obligation to send him to the hospital.

“Be that as it may, that was not a fair or objective basis to suggest Elliston Rahming was not fit to be the Ambassador to the US. That was the root of the problem.”

Mr Wilson declined to name the US official who authored that report, even though he said he had “confronted” him to discuss the situation. He added that the official had started to back off, agreeing the report may have been a mistake.

The Arawak Homes chairman said members of the US Congress had informed him of what happened to Dr Rahming’s nomination, based on information purportedly coming from the Obama White House.

“Friends in the US Congress conveyed to me some views about this individual, and there’s a risk his political ideology so far to the right-wing he would have little reservation doing things like what happened to Elliston Rahming,” Mr Wilson said.

“I’m not saying that’s what happened here (with the Investment Climate report), but what happened to Elliston Rahming was not fair, not supported and not professional. Let all Bahamians be aware that one individual in the US Embassy can cause this country immeasurable damage beyond reason, as happened with Elliston Rahming not being appointed Ambassador to the US.”

Mr Wilson said the US had praised Dr Rahming in the Organisation of American States at the same time as the negative Embassy report came out. He suggested that once such a report got into the US system, the vast bureaucracy made it very difficult to amend or take out.