Prime Minister Philip "Brave" Davis during his contribution to the 2024-25 Budget Debate in the House of Assembly on June 5, 2024. Photo: Dante Carrer/Tribune Staff
By Keile Campbell
Tribune Staff Reporter
kcampbell@tribunemedia.net
PRIME Minister Philip “Brave” Davis said he has personally intervened to cancel work permits that were not “justified".
He did not give specifics.
His comments came during a Progressive Liberal Party southern corridor regional meeting last night.
Mr Davis has repeatedly talked tough about clamping down on work permits.
Ministers did not provide statistics about work permit grants during the recent budget debate in Parliament.
Last year, former Labour Director Robert Farquharson said 40 percent of the 12,000 work permits issued were related to jobs Bahamians could fill, but the failure of Bahamians to apply for the positions contributed to the issuance of work permits.
Last night, Mr Davis said he would meet with the ministers of immigration and labour and their teams “so they can advise the industry partners so there’ll be no confusion or mixed messages between my tongue and teeth".
He added: “I refuse to accept a status quo where Bahamians are qualified and ready to work, yet jobs are kept from them by foreigners. No more companies manipulating job requirements to shut out our own people.
“Our immigration policy, It’s simple: protect Bahamian workers, safeguard businesses in sectors reserved for Bahamians. I’ve personally ordered the cancellation of work permits where they weren’t justified. So let everyone know, Brave insists on Bahamians first in their own country.
“We’re not here to train foreigners for jobs that Bahamians can do. I’ve already stepped in to cancel work permits myself. So, PLPs, spread the word: Brave says Bahamians first in their own country, and I assure you, we’re not teaching any foreigner how to do a job that a Bahamian can do. The PLP has your back.”
In a press statement last night, FNM chairman Dr Duane Sands criticised the PLP and Mr Davis, who accused Michael Pintard of standing with the Grand Bahama Port Authority instead of Bahamians.
Dr Sands said the PLP “prefers spectacle and partying” instead of addressing issues the country faces, such as the water crisis in Eleuthera. He said Mr Pintard travelled to that island on Tuesday to deliver water to residents.
Comments
moncurcool 6 months ago
So are all the foreign consultants not going to be hired anymore?
Guess there is a mixed message between the tongue and teeth.
SP 6 months ago
🤣 The campaign is in FULL throttle!
ExposedU2C 6 months ago
ExposedU2C 6 months ago
This is a most shameful and unlawful direct shake-down of certain work permit holders by corrupt Davis.
Yet he is happy to allow undocumented illegal aliens, and documented ChiCom construction workers, to come to our country and be treated as slave labour thereby taking away decent paying jobs from many currently unemployed Bahamians.
Corrupt Davis is really full of Shiit! And from his self-confessed direct involvement in cancelling work permits, we can only assume he believes his minister of immigration is completely incompetent and that he (Davis) has nothing better to do when he is not lavishly travelling abroad, or acquiring a new luxury car, or re-purposing a seized plane for his use, and perhaps a boat too.
And no doubt corrupt Davis will be allowing the greedy Snake and his cabal of marauders to employ as many foreign workers as they wish once they seize control of BPL and our nation's vital energy sector for mere pennies on the dollar of true value.
This corrupt jack arse of a PM is shamelessly blaming foreign workers and foreign investors for his PLP government's own failed policies over many years that have left so many Bahamians without the education and necessary skill sets to be employable in other than the most menial jobs. And corrupt Davis is at the same time inciting Bahamian workers to turn on their foreign colleagues in the work place.
Bottom-line: The failed economic policies of this corrupt Davis led PLP government iare directly responsible for the ever increasing unemployment rate of both the employable and unemployable people in our country, especially among younger and more elderly Bahamians. For Davis to use work permit holders as the scape goat for his government's many social and economic policy failures simply shows just a small and deceitful a stumpy idiot he truly is.
pablojay 6 months ago
If he truly believes in Bahamians first in our beloved country ,then we would have thrice weekly flights filled with deportees heading back to Haiti.
sheeprunner12 6 months ago
I concur ....... But, the PM said that he is one of them.
Haitians have been given special preferences in this country since 2021. Anyone can see or hear that.
moncurcool 6 months ago
Absolutely,
You can have teh intimidation unit go into CBS Bahamas with guns, and yet that same unit will never go down Cowpen Road whee they are lined up from just after 6:00 in the morning, everyday.
Dawes 6 months ago
So Davis is saying that the immigration department is not working correctly. If it was he wouldn't have to have intervened. Take it no one was terminated or disciplined for this
truetruebahamian 6 months ago
Davis is not in line with our Bahamian morals. Neither are his plp massagers or the disgusting Mitchel crowbar head boy for idiocy.
bahamianson 6 months ago
He should have personally interv3ned when the guy didnt have insurance when building bamsi under his portfolio as minuster. He should have personally intervened when the people voted no to the apparent crooked philanthropist numbers boys and the plp rejected our vote and legalis3d the numbers boys.
SP 6 months ago
Firstly, we always need to remember that PM Philip Edward "Brave" Davis is reputable criminal lawyer and a Kings Counsel.
He is accustomed to, and extremely well seasoned, at successfully defending the worst of the worse by convincing others that something is not as it seems!
This master off deception campaign with promises of having the solution to crime, free electricity, prosperity, lower taxes, etc' however, he delivered the EXACT OPPOSITE.
Now he's convincing his followers that nothing is as it seems, everything is just fine.
sheeprunner12 6 months ago
Right on ..... A PLP pied piper of the highest degree 😳
jamaicaproud 6 months ago
There goes my job, aye bwoy
The_Oracle 5 months, 4 weeks ago
Micromanaging, inserting arbitrary edicts based on breakfast that day or some legitimate or obvious breach of a law? The PM is constrained by the law as much as any citizen. And obviously should be. This speaks to tribal rule encroachment
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