The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Bahamians “should be terrified at the prospect” of the Government allowing Bimini’s developers to build on prime marine habitats, a well-known QC warned yesterday.

Fred Smith, the lead attorney for the Bimini Blue Coalition, sounded the alarm after a senior government official said the proposed Marine Protected Area (MPA) for north Bimini was “never implemented” as promised.

While Philip Weech, the Bahamas Environment, Science and Technology Commission’s (BEST) director, said the Resorts World project lies outside the proposed MPA’s boundaries, Mr Smith is unconvinced.

He produced an overlay showing how the developers’ Rockwell Island project, on which Resorts World’s partner, the Capo Group, broke ground under the Ingraham administration, appeared to be earmarked for a site where development was either supposed to be ‘partially’ or ‘completely restricted’.

The graphic, shown here on Page 1B, compares the proposed MPA boundaries previously traced by Mr Weech with the planned location of Rockwell Island.

“In Mr Weech’s affidavit, they say there is no Marine Protected Area (MPA),” Mr Smith told Tribune Business. “We should be extremely concerned about that. There are obviously plans to give that away.”

Mr Weech, though, in an affidavit compiled for yesterday’s Privy Council hearing, denied that the Resorts World Bimini/Bimini Bay project would impact the area earmarked for the MPA.

“In 2008, Government announced it would declare an area of north Bimini as a Marine Protected Area,” the BEST director alleged.

“The Marine Protected Area was, in fact, never implemented. In any event, the Bimini project is outside the scope of the proposed Marine Protected Area.”

Yet Mr Smith persisted: “The Bahamas should be extremely anxious that the Government does not give it [the MPA land] away.

“Given that the BEST Commission is saying the MPA was never implemented, the Bahamas should be terrified at the prospect of giving that Crown Land away to the developers to destroy the marine habitats, the mangroves of north Bimini, which are the very foundation of the fisheries industry in the northern Bahama banks.

“The northern, central and southern Bahamas form, unique, interconnected ecosystems that are extremely fragile, and could be collapsed by an ignorant and uninformed rush to development.”

Mr Smith was speaking after the Bimini Blue Coalition’s ‘last chance’ bid to halt dredging for Resorts World’s cruise terminal and jetty was rendered moot by the developers claiming the operation had been completed.

As a result, the Privy Council refused to grant the Coalition’s bid for an injunction, with the Callender’s & Co partner once again railing against the secrecy covering the Government’s approvals/permitting process.

The well-known QC was also intrigued by the revelation that Blue Engineering, the Bahamas-based firm that was hired by Resorts World to produce its Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), Environmental Management Plan (EMP) and addendum dealing with the expanded dredging group, “withdrew” from the project on June 10.

Mr Weech’s affidavit revealed: “On June 10, 2014, it came to my attention that Blue Engineering was withdrawing from the project.

“This development does not affect the environmental controls and monitoring systems currently in place, but BEST has recommended to the developers that they should engage another environmental consulting firm to have general environmental oversight of the project.”

In response, Mr Smith said: “Why, at this critical stage, did the company contracted to do the EIA, EMP and addendum before dredging, withdraw?

“There are a lot of questions that need answers, and they should be answered at trial.”

Blue Engineering confirmed to Tribune Business yesterday that it had resigned from the Resorts World project, but declined to comment further.

Despite its dredging injunction setback, the Bimini Blue Coalition plans to press ahead with its substantive Judicial Review challenge to the Resorts World cruise terminal and jetty.

It is now waiting for the Court of Appeal to rule on its challenge to the Supreme Court’s $650,000 ‘security for costs’ Order before determining its next move.

Mr Smith, meanwhile, hit out at the alleged lack of transparency surrounding the Government’s investment approvals process, arguing that it made it almost impossible for affected Bahamians to find out about such projects, and challenge them, before construction work started.

“The lack of respect to our legal system by the Government has been appalling. As with Guana Cay, the Wilson City power plant and now Bimini, keeping the permitting process secret until work has actually started makes it almost impossible to effectively access the judicial system in time to protect local and environmental rights,” Mr Smith said.

“This is why the Bahamas desperately needs an effective Freedom of Information Act so that the Office of the Prime Minister and the Bahamas Investment Authority cannot secretly enter into Heads of Agreements with foreign developers, fail to engage in public consultation or any of the requirements of the Planning and Subdivisions Act etc, and then push a project through, making it too late to then stop…it becomes a runaway train.”

Mr Smith told Tribune Business that the Government had approved the Resorts World project in 2012 or 2013, but the Prime Minister’s Office effectively overrode the statutory consultation processes in the Planning and Subdivisions Act and Conservation and Protection of the Physical Landscape of the Bahamas Act.

“The public was never given notice and provided with a clear opportunity to participate in informed consultation about the project,” the QC added.

“The Bahamas Investment Authority does not exist in law, and there is no statute which gives the Prime Minister’s Office involvement in scrutinising, oversight and permitting. Therein lies the mischief.”