ACKLINS WITHOUT POWER AGAIN

The Bahamas has a problem with its public administration.  If the PLP does not conquer this problem, it is going to end up losing the government, taking the blame for the lack of execution of its policies. Nothing shows the example of that failure in the public administration than the recent example of the Bahamas Power and Light and its performance in Acklins Island.  Last week for the second time in a month, the power was off on the whole island for more than two days.  There were several problems.  The machines were not maintained in the first instance and so when the failure came in one, there was no redundant capacity.  That was then compounded by the fact that neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister for the Corporation was informed about the island-wide failure and the inability of the Corporation to restore power.  It took them three days to restore the power.  They had to be instructed that the very least they could do, on the first occasion, was to inform the residents what was happening. No one answered the phone, no one communicated the failures to the people on the scene.  The Corporation promised the Prime Minister that the failures and defaults would not happen again.  They promised the three engines would be fixed and there would be spare capacity if there were a default in one.  There was a lighting strike early last week. The power failed and it turns out they never fixed the other generators and the island’s power was off again for four days.  They did not tell the Minister again and neither did they inform the Prime Minister.  They did not inform the residents until ordered to do so by the Minister.  Ultimately when they could not fix the generator they had to fly in a new one from Nassau to get the power back on.  This is what we face in The Bahamas.  This has nothing to do with politicians, we assure you.  What do we do?