The Tribune

SPEAKING to a group of aspiring journalists at the College of the Bahamas at the end of March, Prime Minister Perry Christie declared that his government’s performance will not be matched “in the history of this country”.

In The Tribune next day, our cartoonist Jamal Rolle drew a caricature of former prime minister Hubert Ingraham reminding Mr Christie that it was not yet April Fool’s day.

And the town laughed.

But seriously, unless Mr Christie is delusional – and we don’t believe he is — or unless he has a plan to which none of us is privy, there is nothing yet on the horizon to indicate that in the next year and a half anything spectacular will happen to turn today’s political misjudgments into outstanding successes.

However, there is still time for Prime Minister Christie to realise his dream of success. But first he has to take control of his government and lead. He must realise that around him he has many on his team who are not really qualified for the positions they hold, and, of those that are, they have no political philosophy as to the relationship between a democratic government and the people who elected them to serve.

The Christie government, in its first administration, and even moreso in its second, is noted for being surrounded by certain ministers who appear to be their own satellite governments. They ignore their leader and go their own way – until they create unforeseen problems and, to their own embarrassment, have to take a back seat while fences are mended.

Today too many unresolved problems are landing on the desk of the Attorney General where, according to the talk in the market place, they are destined to die. It would be a shame if the Attorney General’s desk were to replace the old trick, used notably by the former UBP government to kill a measure of which it disapproved. In those days, the distasteful proposal was sent to a committee that never reported. It was dead before it was born. This was the technique used in the House of Assembly on the night of January 23, 1956, when the late Sir Etienne Dupuch’s Resolution to end racial discrimination in public places was sent to committee, headed – not by Sir Etienne – but by a UBP member who would make certain that the committee never met. Sir Etienne stood up and objected. He refused to sit down until he was heard. The Speaker ordered his arrest, the crowds in the square below roared in protest, the sergeant-at-arms hesitated. The House was quickly adjourned. That week, a major hotel took out an advertisement in The Tribune to announce that discrimination had ended in its establishment, others followed. Discrimination was at an end even before it was later formalised by legislation in the Constitution.

It was a night that we shall never forget — we were then The Tribune’s reporter at the press table in the gallery.

Today on the Attorney General’s desk for the past two weeks is the report, sent to her from the Commissioner of Police, on the results of his investigation into the complaint that MICAL MP Alfred Gray, as a member of the executive, had interferred in a judicial matter on behalf of one of his constituents in his Inagua district. If true, this would be in breach of the age-old principle that the judicial branch is independent of both parliament and government and will tolerate no interference from either branch.

As well as being MP for MICAL, Mr Gray is also Minister for Local Government and Minister of Agriculture and Marine Resources. As a result of the accusation that he breached the rule of non-judicial interference, he stepped down as Minister of Local Government while the accusation against him was being investigated. However, he has retained his position as Minister of Agriculture and Marine resources with the right to continue to sit around the Cabinet table.

In June last year, giving advice to a new generation of PLP politicians, Mr Gray advised them to learn that they must not be “fast on their tongue”, explaining that a mistake can end a political career. It seems that in this case he failed to take his own advice.

It is claimed that an Inagua mother contacted Mr Gray, her MP, because her teenage son had run afoul of the law, was tried by the Inagua administrator, sentenced to three months in prison and was to be sent to Nassau to serve his time. Mr Gray admits to telephoning the administrator — not to interfere with the case, he said — but to advise him that he had the option of granting bail, as an appeal had been filed. According to the administrator, however, Mr Gray came on in such a way that frightened him into dismissing all charges, and releasing the young man. The administrator admitted he feared for his job. Mr Gray denies all of this.

He says that as an MP he had a duty towards his constituent. Which is true. But as a part of the executive he should have remembered that this was one occasion when he should not have been so “fast on the tongue”. He could have got another lawyer to take care of his constituent and saved himself all of this trouble. No one knows the results of the Commissioner of Police’s investigation. The matter is now on the Attorney General’s desk and there are those of the public who are betting that that is where it will remain. We hope not.

Then there is the BAMSI misstatement by Works Minister Philip Brave Davis that the insurance coverage had lapsed before the Bahamas Agriculture and Marine Science Institute’s dormitories were destroyed by fire only to discover later that the $2.6m structure never had all-risk insurance coverage in the first place. Under the Westminster system of government, a member of parliament who misleads the House automatically steps down. This no-insurance discovery was made two months after the fire.

Mr Davis himself rectified the mistake, explaining that he himself was misled by an “administrative error”.

Then there is the Black and Veach International report on the Rubis oil spill that found that Marathon residents were possibly exposed to harmful chemicals, including cancer-causing benzen. The government had the report for more than a year before it was made public earlier this month. This has led to much consternation among affected residents and accusations by FNM Chairman Michael Pintard that there must be some “historical relationship between the operators of Rubis and the government of The Bahamas”, adding that “I can’t think of any other things that could point to why the government would allow Rubis to get away with this.”

Government is now working overtime to show that it has always acted in the best interest of residents. However, the rejection of government members to a move by one of its own members — Dr Andre Rollins — for a select committee to investigate the leak has not helped the image of the PLP government.

And then in the wings, we have PLP chairman Bradley Roberts taking every opportunity to blame the Ingraham government for the PLP’s failures. His latest sing-song is that the “Christie administration continues to dig the Bahamas out of the deep economic hole the Ingraham government left behind in May 2012”.

This was the trick of the PLP government — always blaming the UBP government for the PLP’s own incompetence. Mr Roberts has to be reminded —as did the Pindling government — that when the UBP was voted out of office, the Public Treasury was solvent with enough money to continue good government. However, in 1992 — 25 years later – when the FNM became the government it found that the PLP had bankrupted the Treasury. It had also bankrupted some small businesses that had to close because the PLP government had not paid what it owed them.

If Mr Christie wants his government to go down in history as the best government that this country has ever had then he must be noted as the Prime Minister who drew the line in the sand. His members will have to respect the people, the rules of parliamentary government, and remember that they are the SERVANTS answerable to their MASTERS – the people. Their secrecy, underhand deals, protection of friends and arrogance must end.

Then and only then will Prime Minister Christie earn his legacy.