Bahama Pundit

Brother Brave vs. Mother Pratt—The Deputy Leadership of the PLP

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.

Though Philip “Brave” Davis is demonstrating the ruthlessness and laser-like ambition needed to become Leader of the PLP and Prime Minister, this is no guarantee of success or of his ability and readiness to lead.

While he possesses the intellectual and financial resources needed to pursue these dual prizes, he must surmount significant obstacles, testing his ruthlessness and ambition as well as his financial prowess and brainpower – and his savvy.

Asking parliamentarians to take a 20 percent pay cut, a cut which a man with his earning capacity would barely feel, he may have won public praise while provoking ill-will among his party’s parliamentary caucus. Has he forgotten that his main audience now is convention delegates, not the general public?

Though dutifully respecting his Leader, calculatingly defending him on occasion to boost his standing among his former law partner’s supporters, Mr.  Davis wants Perry Christie to step aside, post-haste, making room for his vision of a new PLP.

If Mr. Christie is pushed out, which is highly unlikely, or jumps, which is likelier than many imagine, Brave Davis will be waiting – not in the wings like some, but on centre stage.

The Life and Death of Bahamian Political Parties

by Larry Smith

“Mistaken publications of obituaries aren’t as rare as you might expect,” observes The Phrase Finder website. In 1897, for example, the American writer and humourist Mark Twain famously sent a letter to the New York Journal describing a report of his death as an "exaggeration."

We could say the same about the most recent prognostications on the future of the Progressive Liberal Party. And this is not the first time we have heard them. After the 1997 election - when the Free National Movement won 57.6% of the vote with a turnout of 92% - commentators were convinced that the PLP was headed straight for "the boneyard."

That was only five years after the party had suffered its first and only major defeat in a quarter century of absolute ascendancy under the leadership of the late Sir Lynden Pindling. And it was only five years before it won a stunning landslide upset, taking 51.7% of the vote in a turnout of 89%.

Clearly, as the American writer Will Rogers put it: “Both political parties have their good times and bad times, only they have them at different times.”

Leadership Choices for the FNM

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.

Last week’s Front Porch focused on the leadership choices for the Opposition PLP.  Before looking at the FNM’s choices we should recall why the road ahead for the PLP will be long and hard.  

Those calling for the PLP to quickly recover from its electoral defeat two years ago as well as a spate of recent scandals and problems may be jumping the gun.  The main task before the PLP is stabilization and triage.  Only then comes recovery.  The basis for this assessment is not FNM propaganda, it’s PLP candor. 

Leadership Choices for the PLP

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.

Last week, responding to a deafening drumbeat of “woe-is-me, shame and scandal in the family”, Perry Christie insisted that the PLP is not in crisis.  Mr. Christie is correct. The party is not in a crisis.  It is in meltdown.  In desperate need of hope and help, the PLP continues to move forwards never and backwards ever.

Mr. Christie appears to be as delusional in opposition as he was in government. He is bargaining that if he keeps saying there is no crisis, then there is no crisis. And if he ignores something long enough, it will eventually go away.  Apparently, the loss of a fool-proof majority after a single term was not sufficient cause for concern. 

Nor is a procession of bad news, including a leaked confidential report last year on the problems within the PLP, criminal charges against a former Senator, the loss of election cases and the charge of two former chairmen -- Messrs. Galanis and Rigby -- that their party has lost its way.

Change We Can Believe In

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.

Benjamin Netanyahu, a former Israeli prime minister and perennial PM in waiting has copied Barack Obama’s presidential campaign website as some politicians at home are promoting “change” agendas. 

Neither, is change we can believe in.  The belligerent and intolerant Netanyahu has the conciliation skills of Genghis Khan, and the language of change is empty rhetoric unless manifested in meaningful ways.

As argued here previously we do not need nor should we pine for a Bahamian Obama.  This does not mean that our politicians can not draw lessons from this extraordinary figure.

A Bahamian Obama?

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.

Whatever one’s opinion on the strengths and weaknesses or successes and failures of Hubert Ingraham and Perry Christie as Prime Minister, there is a fact upon which all can agree: both leaders are nearing the end of their political journeys.

At ages 61 and 63 respectively, they are currently the longest serving members of the House and have been on the national stage for about half of their lives and most of our post-independence history.  Both entered the House in 1977 with Mr. Christie having been appointed to the Senate in 1974. 

The PLP and The Wizard of Oz

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.

Despite a whiplash return to opposition, much of the PLP’s leadership continues to reside in the often delusional and fantastical world they manufactured out of cotton candy rhetoric and saccharine fantasies during their last term in office.

Most of the PLP’s promises of billions and billions in anchor project dollars were as stable as sandcastles built at shore’s edge where even a lazy incoming tide could easily wash away scores of poorly crafted heads of agreement. 

Now, as economic tidal waves gather momentum, some foreign investors who plotted to use these anchor projects to secure their own speculative land grabs have pulled up anchor and sailed off to target even easier marks.

Many of those PLP leaders who followed the yellow brick road to the rarefied atmosphere of the Cabinet Room, VIP lounges, business and first class, comfortable rides and tony soirees, quickly erected their own version of the Emerald City once elected.

A Historical Perspective on the US Election

 by Larry Smith

This commentary was written a day before the US presidential election, but we can confidently predict that one of two things will have happened by the time you read this.

Either Barack Obama will be the first presidential candidate to be elected without a northern European name, in a landslide reminiscent of Lyndon B Johnson's in 1964. Or, an underestimated John McCain will have scored an upset victory on a scale with Harry S Truman's in 1948.

In case you are not familiar with those two pivotal elections in the middle of the American century, a brief historical review might be useful.

The Twisted Face of Prejudice

by Simon

•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com

A dear friend recalls a revealing story an acquaintance witnessed some years ago on a Family Island. Upon hearing considerable commotion outside an older white Bahamian woman rushed to her window to see what all the fuss was about.

Confronted with two of the local boys fighting, she jeered: “Only black people carry on like that!

Security Minister's Spin Will Do Nothing To Tackle Crime in the Bahamas

by Larry Smith

There were some interesting reactions to the shocking things that former police prosecutor Keith Bell had to say about crime last week.

In case you missed it, Bell told a public forum that I attended last Monday that our criminal justice system was "on the brink of collapse", and we could look forward to kidnappings and terrorism unless it was fixed. He then reeled off a string of horror stories and statistics to support his argument.

"There are 100,000 matters before the courts, including 11,000 criminal cases and 48,000 traffic cases," he said."That's about a third of the total population before the courts. It's going to get a lot worse unless we take the bull by the horns and make some very tough decisions."

Bell said the only way to address the problem was for the political class as a priority to agree on a common agenda for crime reduction and comprehensive legal reform. He also called for an independent national ombudsman to combat corruption, which he said had become institutionalised in business and government.

His considered opinion - as the man in charge of police prosecutions until just a few weeks ago - was that although we have the capacity to act, we lack the tenacity.

Strong stuff. But we were dismayed at the official response. When the Guardian questioned National Security Minister Tommy Turnquest about Bell's comments, he admonished the media not to report such matters because it could affect tourism.