The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Democratic National Alliance (DNA) has ratified five candidates for the next general election - business owner Kendal Smith for the Fox Hill constituency, engineer Ethric Bowe for Southern Shores, accountant Claire Basden in North Abaco, real estate broker Rudolph Dean for Golden Gates and Celi Moss for Centreville.

During the two-hour event at the party’s headquarters on East Street South yesterday, the candidates made their pitch for why the country could do better than alternating between the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) and the Free National Movement (FNM), and why the third party has the solutions.

Of the five, Mr Moss and Mr Smith ran for the party in 2012. Mr Moss received six per cent of the vote while Mr Smith received eight per cent, losing to incumbents Prime Minister Perry Christie and Minister of Immigration Fred Mitchell.

“We have approximately six months before the next general election,” DNA Leader Branville McCartney said. “The PLP will not hand the governance of this country to us. We need to take it from them. We need to dedicate the next six months on working hard in the respective constituencies. We must let people know what our plans are to govern this country.

“We must show them, that there is a better way. They must know, because they feel it, that the status quo cannot continue.

“But all this would be in vain if we do not get people registered to vote and to vote this inept government out. The voting process is the time when we the people will have the say. We will determine our future.

“We will decide if we wish change or more of the same. If you want more of the same of this miserable life, your choice will be the PLP or the FNM, period. And you will have nobody else to blame but yourself. But if you want change, real change for our Bahamas, then you vote DNA.”

Of the candidates, Mr Bowe positioned himself as apolitical, saying he would work to improve the country if Mr Christie asked him to do so.

Nonetheless, he called for PLP Fort Charlotte candidate Alfred Sears to defeat Mr Christie at the PLP’s convention.

He also praised Labour Minister Shane Gibson, recently appointed co-ordinator for Hurricane Matthew relief, saying “he gets things done.”

Meanwhile, Mr Moss was critical of Mr Christie’s representation in the Centreville constituency, calling him “lousy” and “incompetent”.

For her part, Ms Basden spoke about the need to cultivate “community mindsets” in the country.

And Mr Dean, a former supporter of the PLP, said the country is now in the same state it was in “pre-Majority Rule,” with people desperate for “something new and something different”.

As for Mr Smith, he echoed the theme of his counterparts, saying: “They, of the two other major parties, have used the formula God, then self and then country. They, along with family, friends and business partners have grown increasingly rich, while the masses of the Bahamian people continue to suffer. They have soiled and sullied the sacred halls of Parliament, using legislation and diplomacy to the detriment of we, the Bahamian people.”

The DNA ran a full slate of candidates in the last election, but the party did not win any seats. However the party, formed in 2011, received around eight per cent of the total votes.