The Tribune

PLP CHAIRMAN Bradley Roberts and his sidekick, PLP Senator Fred Mitchell, have gone out of their way to criticise the FNM government for at last telling the unvarnished truth —at least as far as the FNM knew it at the time – about the critical state of the economy. They laid it out in their first budget debate in parliament in June giving notice that the new government would have to borrow $323m to cover the deficit for the 2017-2018 fiscal year and an additional $400m to cover the fiscal overhang for 2016-2017.

“In our parliamentary debates, the leader of the opposition, our MPs and senators tried to warn the FNM, stop talking down this economy,” said Mr Mitchell. “We thought it reckless to borrow nearly a billion in their first week in office. We said the only reason for the less than promised fiscal performance (by the PLP) was Hurricane Matthew. Moody’s affirms those facts.” This is not true – Moody did not affirm those facts – if they ever did they are certainly not standing by them now.

The Christie administration probably tried to blame all of the country’s financial woes on Hurricane Matthew, but the hurricane only added to this country’s problems. It did not cause them. In its latest report, Moody’s clearly stated: “The Bahamas economy has performed poorly over the past five years.”

It is true that Moody’s called neither government’s name, as Mr Mitchell affirms, but in this statement only the slow-witted would think that over the “past five years” had anything to do with the FNM. The PLP government was the only government around in the last five years, and so Moody’s was clearly talking about the performance of the PLP. As for Hurricane Matthew being the cause of all of the problems, we must recall that Matthew was not lurking around for five years — the years that the PLP government was playing cat-and-mouse and hiding the truth from Bahamians. Hurricane Matthew hit The Bahamas on October 6, 2016 — only seven months before Bahamians went to the polls and gave the PLP government the “order of the boot”.

The Christie government assured Moody’s that all it had to do was get Baha Mar open and the economy would eventually turnaround. True to its word a section of Baha Mar opened to many invited officials and non-paying guests just 19 days before the election — not in enough time to to have any affect on the economy. It still has had no affect.

“Stop talking down the economy,” begged the Christie government, or else Moody’s will reassess its Baa3 credit rating. Standard and Poor’s Christmas present to The Bahamas was to downgrade this country’s credit rating to junk. All they needed now was for Moody’s to get wind of what was being said by the FNM to attract their attention. And so Mr Mitchell was criticising the FNM for not buttoning their lips. In other words, to put it in the vernacular, the PLP were reminding the FNM that “shut mouth catch no flies!” But the FNM refused to shut their mouths, instead they spoke the truth, earned respect for the country and much-needed help.

This should be a lesson to the PLP – lying, especially to the people, has its consequences. Moody’s has reviewed this country’s status, heard its financial problems, studied its plans for a fiscal rescue, and decided to hold the status at Baa3.

“Although Moody’s changed the country’s credit outlook from stable to negative, its confirmation of its Baa3 rating appears to be one of the first significant victories for the new administration, as a downgrade would have been costly for The Bahamas,” said a statement from government. The statement added that government is also “resolved to bringing greater accountability, transparency and sound fiscal management principles to bear on the country’s finances. Improvements in fiscal management and policy outcomes are being promoted through the planned introduction of Fiscal Responsibility legislation, which will target, inter alia, the achievement of an annual GFS balanced budget deficit that would allow for a more sustainable evolution of the debt to GDP ratio. IMF Technical resources are already on board to assist the Government in ensuring a well-designed legislative and operational framework, which should be finalised prior to the next budget year.”

The FNM government has been in office a little over 100 days and opposition voices are already crying that they have done nothing. To borrow the words of Alexander Pope: “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” The financial situation of this country is so precarious today that it cannot survive “fools” rushing in with quick fixes to impress an impatient people. This government has to be given time to assess a very bad - far worse than we ever imagined - situation and have sober heads come to the rescue. This time the people will have to have patience, because any nonsense now could rock and sink an already listing Ship of State.

When the FNM presented its first budget to parliament members had only had time to have a cursory look at the books. After that superficial search parliament was given an estimate of how much government would have to borrow to stabilise the finances. However, as time has passed and even more unsavoury truths and dumb political decisions are being uncovered do not be surprised if government has not underestimated its debts and will have to go back for even more financial support.

True patriots would not be calling for demonstrations at this time. Those who are now trying to stir up trouble are really showing their true colours. They are proving what we have known of them for some time — their political careers come before the good of their country. They are not true patriots.