Salutations:

I want to thank you all for coming out this morning to share this occasion with me.

I am particularly grateful for your presence, Prime Minister, and for the confidence that you have reposed in me.

I am also especially thankful that my wife and children and other members of my family are here with me as well.

I am deeply appreciative of the opportunity that has been presented to me to be of further service to my beloved country.

All my life I have sought to serve my country to the very best of my ability and to do so with integrity and high purpose.

That sense of high purpose is what inspired me when I stepped forward to join the battle against injustice more than 50 years ago and it is that same sense of high purpose that inspires me now, in the twilight of my career in public life, as I answer this final call to play my part in the continued building of the nation I helped found more than thirty years ago.

I am deeply conscious of the important duties that now press hard upon me.  It is fitting, therefore, that I enter into a covenant with the Bahamian people as I assume the high office to which I have now been called.

I do so in these terms :

I PLEDGE to you that in all that I do, I shall be a unifier, not a divider, of our people.

I PROMISE that in all that I do and say, I shall endeavour to sow the seeds of peace so that all the people of our nation, be they rich or poor, black or white, city dweller or Family Islander, can be brought ever closer to a harvest of social harmony and happy concord.

I COVENANT with you that I shall strive always to bring people together and to foster in them that spirit of unity and cohesiveness without which all our nation-building efforts are in vain.

Patriotism!

Service Above Self!

Love of Country!

Love and Respect for Each Other!

These are the virtues that I shall seek always to instill in our people, especially our young, for I know only too well that in our nation today the virtues of which I speak stand in need of replenishment and renewal as never before.

Each of must play a part in meeting that challenge.  As for myself, with God’s help and your support, I intend to play mine.

Let us, therefore, march together in solidarity and with common purpose to make of our country the greatest little nation upon the face of God’s Good Earth.

Together we can do it!

LONG LIVE THE COMMONWEALTH OF THE BAHAMAS!

Governor General His Excellency the Hon. Arthur D. Hanna smiles as he walks past family members after inspecting the the Royal Bahamas Defence Force Guard of Honor on Wednesday, February 1, 2006 at Government House. (BIS Photo: Tim Aylen)