The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

I read in The Tribune that Bain and Grants Town MP Travis Robinson has formally requested, via a written note to House Speaker Halson Moultrie, to address the House of Assembly at its next meeting.

Despite the contents of the letter not being leaked to the press, the Free National Movement (FNM) is rife with rumours that the Bain and Grants Town MP is planning on abandoning the party in order to become an independent.

I recall reading a Punch tabloid story in 2016 on Robinson’s independent candidacy before his amalgamation with the FNM.

The reader may recall that Robinson was not the initial choice for Bain and Grants Town. It was Leonard Sands. The former FNM standard bearer in Bain and Grants Town ended his candidacy in August 2016. I think Robinson was a godsend for the FNM.

He was hailed as an ambitious political prodigy and a bold activist before he joined the governing party. If there’s a grain of truth to the rumour of him moving on from the FNM, then one is left to assume that Robinson is nursing a grudge against Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis for terminating him from his $45,000 a year parliamentary secretary post in the Ministry of Tourism.

If Moultrie grants Robinson’s request, his speech would be, in my estimation, the most anticipated one since Sir Lynden O Pindling’s much heralded farewell address to Parliament in July 1997.

Pindling had served as MP for 41 years and as prime minister for 25 years. That farewell speech was perhaps his finest delivered in his decades-long career in frontline politics. The eyes of The Bahamas were fixated on ZNS TV 13 as the father of the nation addressed his parliamentary peers for the final time.

No doubt, the eyes of the country will be fixated on the Parliamentary Channel if and when Robinson addresses Parliament. I understand that neither the FNM’s parliamentary caucus nor its executive branch is privy to what Robinson intends to speak on, which has only fueled rumours that Robinson will be officially severing ties from the governing FNM.

Robinson’s rise in politics reads like the story of David and Goliath. The major headline that came out of the 2017 general election was the shocking defeat of former Prime Minister Perry Christie by Reece Chipman in Centreville.

It was so shocking that the defeat of the late Dr Bernard Nottage by the 22-year-old Robinson was treated as if it were an inconsequential story.

In any other election cycle, Nottage’s defeat would have been a major development. Robinson got 61 percent of the votes while Nottage got just 35 percent. Obviously, Robinson’s youth played a role in such a massive landslide.

Even before his amalgamation with the FNM, Robinson was an attractive alternative to the hundreds of millennials in Bain and Grants Town. While I think the FNM would have still won Bain and Grants Town had Robinson never joined the party, I still view him as an invaluable MP. He represents the future of the FNM.

His vote against the move to increase VAT to 12 percent mustn’t be viewed as him being anti-FNM. As a populist, he was standing up for his impoverished constituents, however misinformed they are about the dire financial situation of The Bahamas.

At times, I am left to wonder if the executive branch of the FNM is doing a good enough job of communicating with its massive parliamentary caucus. There seems to be a disconnect between the caucus and the Cabinet, so much so that Finance Minister K Peter Turnquest did not inform FNM backbenchers that the government was planning on raising VAT to 12 percent.

In Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings film, the elf Galadriel informed Frodo that the Fellowship is breaking. I hope that is not the case with the FNM and Robinson.

Minnis has got to extend an olive branch to the Rebel Four, before their dissent and malcontentment spreads like cancer. Any dissent will not bode well for his government. There has to be some reconciliation. Whatever the case may be, Robinson’s speech will undoubtedly draw the attention of tens of thousands of politically observant Bahamians.

KEVIN EVANS

Freeport, Grand Bahama,

June 24, 2018