The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

THE FNM under Dr Hubert Minnis can win this election without any help from other opposition forces, including soon-to-be former Long Island MP Loretta Butler-Turner and her former ally, DNA Leader Branville McCartney.

With an impressive slate of candidates, Minnis and Co are more than ready to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

It was just this past December PLP sycophants were breathing a sigh of relief after Butler-Turner and six former FNM MPs back-stabbed Minnis by having the figurehead of the PLP Governor General Dame Marguerite Pindling remove him as official Opposition leader in Parliament.

The move by Butler-Turner made the FNM appear in the watching eyes of the electorate to be discombobulated and in disarray.

The FNM must now formally wash its hands of Butler-Turner, as she has spent the greater part of the last three years undermining the FNM leadership.

The FNM must form no alliance with her, as her political stock has plummeted. She cannot be trusted. The same can be said of Butler-Turner’s former Senate leader, McCartney.

Like Butler-Turner, McCartney is suffering from a serious case of narcissistic personality disorder. He has an inflated view of his own importance to the country.

Minnis’ revelation that McCartney demanded 16 seats as a prerequisite for an alliance between his fledgling party and the FNM, a major political organisation which has been the government thrice in the last 25 years, should have offended all FNMs. It was unreasonable and borderline offensive to expect Minnis not to field any candidates in Bamboo Town, North Abaco and Central and South Abaco-- three seats the FNM has a great chance of winning without any assistance from McCartney.

The FNM held North Abaco since Hubert Ingraham’s merger with the FNM in the early 1990s and his retirement in 2012.

North Abaco is currently held by Renardo Curry, a PLP MP who has seemingly fallen off the political cliff since his by-election victory in late 2012. Curry has been virtually invisible, amid talks that the PLP has pretty much conceded defeat in that area.

Central and South Abaco is currently held by Edison Key, one of the rebel MPs. FNM candidate James Albury should win that seat with ease. Abaco will once again be FNM Country.

As for Bamboo Town, McCartney received 1,022 votes in 2012. Undoubtedly he played spoiler to the FNM’s Cassius Stuart, who got 1,661 votes to the then PLP Renward Wells’ 1,940 votes. I believe the FNM takes Bamboo Town. In total, the DNA got 13,225 or 8.48 percent of the votes.

Many of those who voted DNA had no way of knowing that their protest votes would ensure a PLP victory and cause the country to go through five years of living hell under the Christie government.

Hindsight being 20/20, many of these voters would have voted differently. Despite the many political cast-offs and opportunists who have fled to the DNA in order to receive a nomination, the DNA will not win a seat. The party will not even receive 10,000 votes.

McCartney, after he is routed once again in Bamboo Town, will gather up his marbles and return home sobbing.

Hopefully, this inevitable election defeat for McCartney and the DNA will be the nail in his political coffin. Bahamians now see that the only viable alternative to the PLP is the FNM. McCartney and his leadership team will not be negatively impacted by another five years of PLP misrule.

They’ve got it made. It is the small man who will catch eternal hell, as is the case right now. Rank-and-file Bahamians must realise that a vote for the DNA is a vote for the PLP.

THE WHISTLEBLOWER

Nassau,

March 8, 2017.