Former Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis wipes a tear away at a church service yesterday marking 50 years of the Free National Movement, during which he thanked supporters having ruled out any bid to continue as party leader. Photo: Racardo Thomas/Tribune Staff
By RASHAD ROLLE
Tribune Senior Reporter
rrolle@tribunemedia.net
AFTER announcing on Friday that he will not let himself be nominated for leader at next month’s convention, former Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis cried during a church service yesterday while thanking his supporters and emphasising his commitment to the Free National Movement.
“As a former prime minister and whatever role is assigned to me, I will support the work of the opposition to advocate on behalf of the Bahamian people and to hold the government accountable. It has been an extraordinary privilege to serve our country as prime minister and as member of Parliament,” he said, fighting back tears.
Several times during his speech, Dr Minnis had to pause as he became emotional.
“We all need God’s grace. Where I have made mistakes I ask for your forgiveness. I am not perfect and I never will be,” he said, his words bringing many of the attendees in the church to their feet in applause.
He thanked his wife Patricia and his family for their support during his time as prime minister.
“To the Bahamian people, I say a warm and heartfelt thank you for my time being your prime minister. You, the Bahamian people, are a strong, hard working and resilient people. “Hurricane Dorian did not break you, the pandemic has not broken you, your trust in the God has brought us this far.”
Dr Minnis also maintained his commitment to the FNM.
“I have been an FNM from my youth. I have no other political home or affiliation. I will remain loyal and faithful to the Free National Movement and its values,” he said.
His speech came as the FNM celebrated its 50th anniversary with a service at the Church of God of Prophecy, East Street Tabernacle. At the event, Dr Minnis also touted the various things his administration achieved during its four year term.
Dr Minnis said in a statement on Friday that he will not nominate for leadership of the party when the FNM holds a one-day leadership convention on November 27, nor will he allow his name to be placed in nomination.
The statement came amid speculation that although he told FNM executive committee and Central Council members last month that he will step aside as leader, he would still vie for the post if someone nominates him.
“At the end of November, the Free National Movement will hold a one-day convention to elect the leader of the party. I will not nominate for the leadership nor will I allow my name to be placed in nomination. I wish those who will contest for the leadership the very best,” his statement on Friday noted.
“I will continue to serve in the House of Assembly as the member of Parliament for Killarney. I again thank the constituents of Killarney for their support since 2007 and during the recent general election,” his statement said.
“We remain in a deadly global pandemic. I will continue to promote measures to save and to protect the lives and livelihoods of Bahamians, utilising my experience in office and as a medical doctor. I will never tire in advocating for the needs of the poor, the disadvantaged and the more vulnerable in our society.”
Dr Minnis’ statement on Friday came hours after former Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham told reporters that it was clear the FNM would have a new leader after its convention.
“It is clear as day to me, that the current leader of the FNM will no longer be leader of the FNM after the convention on November 27,” Mr Ingraham said. “He has already told us he’s not running for the office anymore and the party has determined it will hold a one-day convention for the sole purpose of electing a leader. And that is what is going to happen.”
Only Central Grand Bahama MP Iram Lewis has confirmed publicly that he will run for the leader at the convention. Marco City MP Michael Pintard is also expected to seek the post. According to sources, East Grand Bahama MP Kwasi Thompson is leaning towards running for the post as well.
On Thursday, St Barnabas MP Shanendon Cartwright said he is considering running for a leadership role in the FNM but stressed that such a role goes beyond leader and includes deputy leader or party chairman.
Comments
Cobalt 3 years ago
I don’t understand why Dr. Minnis is crying. He brought this on himself and his party. His hostile and careless attitude towards the immediate concerns of the Bahamian people is why the FNM lost. It almost seems as if Hubert Minnis did everything in his power to guarantee an FNM loss.
OMG 3 years ago
Love the keyboard warriors like yourself who obviously have all the answers. Lets see, Minnis had a devastating hurricane but of course under the PLP it would not have happened, then a worldwode pandemic which minds far brighter than you or I struggle to solve/ contain and incur huge national debts. Of course the PLP would have completely contained this virus at no cost to the country whilst enduring that tourist arrivals remained the same as pre covid. Minnis may not be perfect and in hindsight may have dome somethings different but if you believe Brave Davies would have the majic answer you are deluded.
ThisIsOurs 3 years ago
Leaders dont get to pick and chose the adversity that faces them, nor do they get a crystal ball to prepare for the specific challenge
I am sick of hearing we've never done this before. FNM forget "young" as a criteria, please find someone who been through some stuff and knows how to battle adversity
Leaders never get to say life wasnt fair and you had an easier time than me. Its expected that as leader you have the intelligence and wisdom to handle the "ordinary" and greater intelligence and wisdom to galvanize a crack team to help you fight the extraordinary.
Dr Minnis' greatest failure was that he had zero interest in having talented people around him. He wanted FNM and he wanted absolute loyalty. He even went a step further he attempted to starve talent. Hence Renward Wells to oversee the greatest challenge we have ever faced in 2000 years.
He did bring this on himself
tribanon 3 years ago
And just think how many lives this man has ruined in the 4+ years he was PM. Minnis's tears are all about him finally realizing he's "one and done" for good and to that many of us say "Amen, and praise be to God".
This utterly disgraceful power-juiced tyrant brought real tears of grief, sorrow and misery to the eyes of so many of our fellow Bahamians in the aftermath of Dorian and during the height of the pandemic. And his great borrowing binge has financially crippled our nation for many decades to come, if not forevermore.
In his case, simply going to church, shedding a tear or two and saying he's sorry just won't cut it as recompense for the many lives his misdeeds have destroyed. Remorse is one quality Minnis will never truly have and forgiveness can only ever come to those who are truly remorseful.
carltonr61 3 years ago
He cried for loss of personal absolute Fascist, kingsmanship extreme power. Thousands lost jobs, turned gray with stress after going hungry and hundreds of Bahamians died without a tear from him. Now Brave has the daunting and monumental task of healing this nation and bringing us back from beyond the jagged precipice he left us on. He should seek exile somewhere. The ever worsest cruel papa Doc of Bahamian history equal to none.
joeblow 3 years ago
... pride precedes a fall and few were as arrogant and proud as Minnis. He was as bad for the country as covid. Not sad to see him go!
Topdude 3 years ago
Please Dr. Minnis. Please, please change your mind. Please stay don’t go. If we got on our knees and pleaded with you would stay? Please stay don’t go.
We who love you are without our anchor in life. You must have been aware that there is no one else in the Bahamas who is capable of leading us.
I will give you seven days to change your mind before the public protests and demonstrations begin. How could you even think about not running for leader? Did you not think about the impact this will have on your followers?
I am beginning to suffer from PTSD. Please stay. Please.
tribanon 3 years ago
Not to worry @Topdude. You will always retain your well-deserved title as Minnis's chief sycophant on this website. I must say though that it's easy for many of us to be your polar opposite when we think back and reflect on Minnis's terrorizing reign over us. God only knows how you can be so dismissive of all of the evil power-juiced Minnis embodied and showered on many of us in a most vindictive way.
Topdude 3 years ago
I am not aware of any terrorizing done by our beloved Prime Minister Minnis to the people of the Bahamas. Perhaps we see the world differently.Quite to the contrary I am aware of his nurturing, caring and empowering leadership. That you would see terror in nurture suggests to any objective person that you are a weirdo of the highest order. You see evil when there is good, you sense anger when there is joy and identify with the devil when you should fly with the angels. Get a life.
tribanon 3 years ago
We didn't expect you to recognize his theatrical tear or two for what they truly are, i.e. crocodile tears.
You really should stick to cooking his stew fish. LOL
ThisIsOurs 3 years ago
Someone please get @Top some PTSD counselling
FrustratedBusinessman 3 years ago
You have to be a Minnis burner account lol.
sheeprunner12 3 years ago
At least the FNM has a measure of class and order ..... Unlike the PLP. Minnis will be fine, he'll continue to do his job as MP. Only regret is that HAI and HAM should reconcile to make the FNM stronger.
tribanon 3 years ago
To say Minnis has "a measure of class and order" really takes the cake. Only someone with a very short memory could say that.
sheeprunner12 3 years ago
I said that the FNM has class and order. Please stop focusing on personalities and focus on the party as a whole. That is the main problem in our country today.
tribanon 3 years ago
Minnis is the focal point of the article, but obviously you're free to talk about all of the "class and order" that you believe the FNM party represents under Culmer and the current members of its executive board and its council.
sheeprunner12 3 years ago
Compare the FNM with Mitchell, BP and the PLP mafia. Stop being a Minnis hater. We need to look logically at this broken democracy that we live in AND how to fix it
tribanon 3 years ago
And of course you think being a great disliker (possibly hater) of the PLP, Mitchell, Davis, etc. will somehow help fix our broken democracy. You might be right, but I can assure you the political elite within the PLP and FNM are just different sides of the same coin when it comes to their gross incompetence and corruption in governing. Voter stupidity is why all of the pinging and ponging between the FNM party and the PLP party has worked so well for the political elite in both parties over the past 25 years. Minnis came along and wanted to transform us into a police state with himself self-annointed as dictator. But thankfully that was discarded as a logical fix to the problems facing our democracy.
birdiestrachan 3 years ago
roc wit doc had no heart and no soul. he did all he could to make the rich richer and he could not care less about the poor.
among liars, he was the best.
But mind you the others are more or less just like him.
tribanon 3 years ago
Given Minnis's insatiable thirst for power and penchant for tyranny, many of us would be much more comforted had he instead said:
"I shall never again seek to be nominated or allow my name to be placed in nomination for the leadership of the FNM."
Honestman 3 years ago
He came to power with the pledge that his FNM would be so different from the Christie administration, that he would herald in a government that was truly for the people, a government that would be transparent and intolerant of any corrupt practices. Instead Minnis treated the people with contempt and regarded journalists as the enemy. He and the FNM might have gotten another term because of the exceptional circumstances of Dorian and Covid but he was ultimately voted out because the voters saw him as a complete hypocrite. Diss the voting public and you are out - it's quite straight forward.
mandela 3 years ago
After not serving his full term he should also not be paid the PM's salary that is paid to the former PM's after emitting office.
ThisIsOurs 3 years ago
We suffer from short memories. I'm sure the Tribune could write an entire article on the number of apologies Dr Minnis gave followed shortly by a 360 into the budding despot that he was. Power does not suit Dr Minnis, and thats how it is with some people, if he were made leader tomorrow we'd all suffer under the whip apology forgotten
tribanon 3 years ago
Bingo!
SP 3 years ago
History shows Pindling, Ingraham, Christie, and Minnis, all drank deeply from the UBP cup of corporate corruption and quickly became heartless dictators looking out for the well-being of the rich while ignoring the greater needs of the masses.
These 4 clowns knowingly sacrificed themselves for personal gain to please a handful of pirate families that have suppressed and held and our country and people in bondage for 100's of years!
One day the Bahamas will get a PM with the fortitude and moral compass to stand up to the pirates and do what is best for the country and our people.
Until that day, the "one and done" rule of compromised prime ministers will continue!
“The power of the people is much stronger than the people in power”
sheeprunner12 3 years ago
The only ppl winning in this dysfunctional democracy are the merchant politician oligarchy. Sounds like 1973 didn't change much ...... Except $10B national debt & 100,000 Haitians
SP 3 years ago
More like 100,000 "legal" Haitians that sponsored 200,000+ illegal Haitians and counting.
FrustratedBusinessman 3 years ago
Really don't feel sorry for him, Minnis was a huge disappointment. He would have won in a landslide if he would have done half of what was in the FNM 2017 manifesto. Instead, he lost to Davis out of all people lol.
Will the FNM learn anything from the past 4.5 years? Probably not. The same core of the previous government is still there, and as recent Bahamian elections have shown, you only have to wait for the other party to fail. Bahamians will forever be stuck in the FNM/PLP mindset.
SP 3 years ago
I totally agree, It is unimaginable for Minnis to lose and so overwhelmingly to someone stupid enough to suggest women should be given whistles to protect themselves against assault! The only things missing are drums and cowbells....Lol.
I am disappointed that none of the local comedians have not come up with a skit of a woman being assaulted, blowing her whistle for help, only to be immediately joined by people with drums, cowbells...Lol.
ThisIsOurs 3 years ago
actually I recall reading a story of an African country that uses the techniques to protect women from rape. I know criminals don't like having attention drawn to them but who knows how effective it would really be.. its something, noise can be a defence
bahamianson 3 years ago
Bulla , go eat your boil fish. Erryting Kool.
M0J0 3 years ago
The fnm hasn't learnt anything, they will suffer for years. If Mr. Davis does not pass on the torch the plp will also suffer. It will take new young innovative minds with a new vision for leadership. Just like the workplace too many ole farts stinking up the dam place.
ohdrap4 3 years ago
GODSPEED.
WITH PUNCTUATION
OH GOD ! SPEED !!! SPEED!!!
mandela 3 years ago
The only reason that Ex-PM Minnis is crying is that now he has no more bodyguard to go along on his exercise route in the mornings.
TalRussell 3 years ago
All We Colony's former premier needs transcend into a real person is reach out to Facebook, but he will need to brung along a least a single fake friend and and there, emself has a Facebook page and everything like this and that. There, it can be that simple, — Yes?
SP 3 years ago
Why Minnis is crying is beyond comprehension. He made campaign promises that gave him a huge landslide victory that most of which would have been easy to implement during the pandemic while the country was closed because he had less to deal with.
Instead, he did the exact opposite of what he promised and was rightfully flushed down the toilet by the people just like all his predecessors!
Dumbass politicians have this notion that Bahamians are stupid people with short memories. This has been proven incorrect by Pindling, Ingraham, Christie, and now Minnis.
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