Former Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham, who is also leader of the Free National Movement, said Saturday night that he will begin to announce candidates in May for the next general election and plans to hold a mass rally in New Providence that same month.
“As we approach the general elections, which [are] sooner than many think, the governing party will be returning to the people in search of a second term,” Mr. Ingraham said.
“I do not believe the Bahamian people are ready or willing to grant them their request.”
The FNM leader was the keynote speaker at the installation banquet for the FNM Grand Bahama Women’s Association, held at Old Bahama Bay Resort.
Last Wednesday, during a press conference to release the preliminary report of the Constitutional Review Commission, Prime Minister Perry Christie – with a chuckle – said Commission Co-Chairman Paul Adderley was being too generous in suggesting that the next election is 15 months away.
The report recommends that the constitution be changed to provide equality of the sexes. It was a throwback to the 2002 referendum called by the Ingraham government, which was overwhelmingly rejected by Bahamian voters.
On Saturday night, Mr. Ingraham pointed to the irony in what the commission is now recommending.
“You would recall that it was the FNM [that] sought to remove general inequalities entrenched in our constitution,” the former prime minister said.
“That was among the number of proposed amendments to the constitution that the PLP voted for in parliament, but then energetically urged the electorate to vote against – as though equal rights for women were something Bahamians should be opposed to.”
He added, “Ironically, the same amendment the PLP told Bahamians to reject now appears as one of the recommended amendments put forward by the government’s constitutional reform commission in its recent report; wrong on our watch, but now right on theirs?”
Mr. Ingraham urged the gathering to get rid of the PLP.
“No divisionary tactic will do,” he said. “Keep your eyes on the prize – the Government of The Bahamas. Now is not the time to deliberate amendments to the constitution. Now is the time to be rid of this directionless and incompetent government. There’ll be plenty of time to determine whether we want His Excellency A. D. Hanna to be governor general or president.”
The Commission recommends that the English monarch no longer be head of state of The Bahamas and that the office of the governor general be abolished.
It said The Bahamas should be a democratic parliamentary republic with the head of state being the president.
Both the prime minister and Mr. Adderley foreshadowed that there will be a referendum so that Bahamians could decide what constitutional changes they want made, but Mr. Christie said it is not likely that the referendum will take place before the next election.
On Saturday night, Mr. Ingraham also pointed to what he called the suffering Grand Bahama experienced and continues to experience under the Christie Administration.
“While both men and women on this island have suffered from the neglect and inadequate planning of this present government, we are acutely aware that women, particularly single Grand Bahamian mothers in large numbers, are struggling to realise the help and hope that was promised, but not delivered to them,” he said.
“I have been hurt by what this government has permitted to transpire in this the second largest population centre in our country, the site of our second city, the island with the most diversified economy in our chain.”
He said he is “stunned” by the government’s “failure to stop the hemorrhaging of jobs” in the tourism sector following the damage of the 2004 storm season.
Referring to comments made by Prime Minister Christie during the Grand Bahama Business Outlook seminar earlier this month, Mr. Ingraham said he was “stunned” that Mr. Christie “gave none of us any expectation that his government has taken control of the issues impacting the future of this island”.
“What little thought he had seems to have been about the upcoming elections,” Mr. Ingraham said.
He added that it is disturbing that the government “lacks the will and the competence to deal with the multitude of problems that faces people all over the country” and said the government’s “slothfulness” has led to misery and loss in Grand Bahama.
The Bahama Journal
