The Tribune

PRIME Minister Philip “Brave” Davis last night gave a wide-ranging interview touching on a host of issues affecting the Bahamian public.

Buckle up, it’s time to take a ride through some of the many points covered while being interviewed on ZNS by his former press secretary, the general manager of the Broadcasting Corporation of The Bahamas, Clint Watson.

Let’s start with BPL – Mr Davis says people are going to start seeing a drop in their bills, and just about right away. This month, in fact.

Good news for people’s pockets – but then in the next breath, there was bad news for people’s pockets. Gas prices are going to go up. That will be a rise of 25 cents per gallon for gasoline and 15 cents per gallon for diesel.

That will be bad news for consumers, of course, but something that gas retailers have long been calling for. The last margin increase was back in 2011, so it has been some time.

Mr Davis talked up his administration’s achievements in economic terms – though said the delay in implementing the rise in gas margins had been down to the fact that the time was not right. He said a year and a half ago, an initia- tive had gone ahead to assist but that the administration said they would get back to retailers. Now is that time.                       

Turning to the police probe into allegations of corruption at the highest levels, he said that the public is right to be concerned – and noted that there has to be confidence in the police. That is something this column has argued on many occasions – especially in regard to transparency in the investigation. Mr Davis noted the concern – but gave no indication of any likelihood of transparency, instead asking people to trust the process. Given the violence that has surrounded the matters at the heart of this investigation, that is a big ask.

Next up, the murder count. Mr Davis said the government is focusing on prevention and targeting young men to steer them away from violence. Alas, in this friendly court, he was not pressed on how the government was going to prevent the country hitting 100 murders for yet another year. There is no answer yet on how that prevention is going to work.

Then there was the issue of campaign donations – another area where transparency seems to be absent. He talked generally of the importance of making sure donors are genuine – but with no indication of how that is supposed to be done if there are no rules governing donations and no public scrutiny possible given that donations are not reported publicly.

Given that campaign finance legislation was in the party’s campaign platform, that is a little too easy a brush-off which did not get strongly pushed back on in the interview.

There was more too – but broadly speaking, the emphasis was clear. Mr Davis has put the economy as the central focus, and that is the plank he is leaning on.

With an election still distant on the horizon, but of course getting closer, that will leave a lot riding on how much the economic impact has reached people’s pockets when it comes to time to vote.

Mr Davis still has more questions to answer. We hope he opens the door to interviews from other outlets in coming days.