MICHAEL PINTARD AND THE STRUGGLE TO REMAIN RELEVANT

The FNM is dead as a doornail and irrelevant in the scheme of things in the new political order.  This is likely only a temporary phenomenon in the way these things go, just after the resounding defeat they suffered in the general election.  They are in the rebuilding phase.  The Bahamian public is simply concentrating on the new sheriff in town and all the good and that the new sheriff is going to give away.

So you watched with bemusement as Michael Pintard one of three MPs who are vying for the Leadership of the FNM tried to pit himself as a centrist himself in the FNM for the country’s sake and at the same time a defender of the faith.  His performance last week on the  bill to put in place the transition provisions for the covid rules was interesting.

What he was saying is that there was nothing new in the rules, that the FNM was in the process of doing it anyway, and that the PLP ought to give credit to the FNM for ensuring that the tourism product got to the point where it is now.

We understand that is his story and he has to stick to it.  But what it ignores is the meanness of the FNM government.  He tried to say that the FNM did not fire 2500 people from the public service.  He called for the Deputy Prime Minister to withdraw the allegation.  Mr. Cooper refused.  But whether or not it’s 2500, as soon as he made the claim that the FNM did not fire 2500 people, the phones of the PLP MPs lit up with class of people from urban renewal and from the  public service generally who said that the FNM gave them their walking papers.

Who can forget the singular cruelty meted out to the  seniors members of the Royal Bahamas Police Force?  They were sent away with nothing to do.  What about Simon Wilson, the Financial Secretary, accused falsely of malfeasance and they tried to fire him? Sent him away to do nothing for four and half years.

We are again calling for there to be a Commission of Inquiry with a single Commissioner charged with the responsibility of looking into the pandemic, the financial situation , the abuse of power issues alleged under the FNM.  This is the only way to get some accountability for the ablute cruelty of the group that governed us, and their cluelessness of the cruelty which they inflicted on the Bahamian people.