The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

A former MP yesterday said Freeport residents have been caught up in “a three-way love affair that’s gone awry”, adding: “Because of the lack of vision the people are perishing.”

Rev Frederick McAlpine, who was prominent in Friday’s demonstration outside the Grand Bahama Port Authority (GBPA), told Tribune Business that businesses and inhabitants of The Bahamas’ second city were like the “children” caught up in a “bad marriage” involving Freeport’s quasi-governmental regulator, the Government and Hutchison Whampoa.

Asserting that the three major players in Freeport “don’t appear to be on the same page”, he agreed that Freeport’s deterioration since 2004 had been exacerbated by the failures of successive administrations to hold the GBPA’s “feet to the fire” on fulfilling the governance and developmental responsibilities that it signed up to under the Hawksbill Creek Agreement.

Asked about the way forward for Freeport now, Mr McAlpine said there needed to be “proper consultation” with Freeport residents and the GBPA’s 3,500 licensees. He also suggested that the Government pressure the Hayward and St George families to find a purchaser for the GBPA and its Port Group Ltd affiliate, or acquire “a portion” itself.

As to the possibility, as provided for by the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, that the GBPA’s quasi-governmental powers be devolved into an undefined local authority if 75 percent of its licensees vote in favour of such a move, the ex-Pineridge MP dismissed the notion, saying: “That’s not happening. You can forget that. It’s just not happening.”

Mr McAlpine, suggesting that Friday’s demonstration had made Freeport residents and Grand Bahamians “more aware” of the city’s economic plight, said the blame could not be placed on the Davis administration which has barely been in office six months.

“It lies at the feet of successive governments not ensuring the Port Authority has done what it should do, and has to do, to make Grand Bahama a better economic place,” he said. “Successive governments have not held the Port Authority responsible for where Grand Bahama should be....

“If you go back to what was agreed by the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, the responsibility for the airport and hospital lies solely with the Port Authority. The reality is that it seems like 18 years since the death of Edward St George, from that time to now, it’s been stagnation.”

Freeport has never recovered from the devastation inflicted by Hurricanes Frances and Jeanne, which resulted in the closure of the Royal Oasis and 1,100 persons being made redundant, which cost the city much of its population and critical mass. And that was compounded by Mr St George’s passing several months later.

Hinting that there should be changes in the GBPA’s executive management, Mr McAlpine yesterday suggested that Freeport’s quasi-governmental authority had become “another tax regime that taxes the people and doesn’t seem to be putting the money back into the island”.

The GBPA extracts significant income from a variety of licence fees and service charges, and the ex-MP added of the current owners and management: “There seems to be a lack of vision. They seem to lack the ability to draw investors and investment to Grand Bahama itself.

“I hate to say it this way, but it seems to have been for some time now that the Government, the Port Authority and Hutchison Whampoa, which is the Port’s partner, it seems like a marriage that has gone bad but the inhabitants of Grand Bahama are like the children because of this fight going on, this separation going on.

“It has left us, the children, the people, frustrated as regards what is going on between Hutchison, the Port Authority and the Government. It doesn’t appear that Hutchison, the Port Authority and the Government are on the same page. It’s like we’re between a rock and a hard place. You have this friction between the three,” Mr McAlpine added.

“We, the inhabitants of the island, who I would call the children in this marriage, are suffering because of their relationship or lack thereof. There is basically a three-way triangle, a three-way love affair that’s gone awry.

“If we’re being quite honest, nobody seems to have lived up to the Hawksbill Creek Agreement and the Government has not held their feet to the fire in terms of the Port Authority. There is a lack of vision, and because of the lack of vision the people seem to be perishing.”

There is sufficient blame to go around. The Government has always been reluctant to let Freeport go, fearing it gave too much away via the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, while the GBPA - especially over the last 18 months - is seen as not having lived up to its development obligations. Hutchison, meanwhile, has dumped its loss-making assets on the Government.

Little has been done to move forward with the 2o16 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that was signed between the Government, GBPA and Hutchison, which committed the Hayward and St George families to seek out a purchaser of their shares.

It also committed the Grand Bahama Development Company (DEVCO) and Freeport Commercial and Industrial, Freeport’s two largest private landowners, to produce a 20-year ‘master plan’ for their holdings by April 26, 2017.

The GBPA agreed to permit two government-appointed directors to its Board “to achieve a more effective working relationship” between Nassau and Freeport, and “vibrant and sustained economic growth” for the latter city.

The Government was also to have a direct role in real estate-based developments, after the GBPA ownership agreed to transfer their 100 per cent and 50 per cent equity interests, respectively, in the city’s two major landowners into a newly-formed company.

The Government was to then acquire a 10 per cent equity interest, with a possible option for another 5 per cent stake, in the new company established to own the ordinary share capital of Freeport Commercial & Industrial and DEVCO.

The Haywards and St Georges also agreed to far-reaching governance reforms, and the potential devolution of some of their quasi-governmental powers/regulatory authority, via their MoU commitments.

The agreement committed them to working with the Government to create “a mechanism to ensure the exercise of the regulatory powers and functions vested in the GBPA are consistent with the national policy, regulations and laws of the Bahamas”.