While saying that the plan to move the shipping port from downtown Nassau to southwestern New Providence is “a very active process at this time”, Minister of Energy and the Environment Dr. Marcus Bethel was unable to give a timeframe for the move.
“At this stage we are meeting with the persons involved on a regular basis and all the business owners downtown to chart the way forward,” Dr. Bethel told The Bahama Journal.
But he noted that the move will not happen in the immediate future.
“This is a plan that is extended over many years and won’t happen overnight because, of course, a new port will have to be built and so those things don’t happen overnight,” said Dr. Bethel, who recently was given ministerial responsibility for the downtown transformation.
“There are lots of planning and designing and a lot of work to go into it.”
It was during his speech at the Progressive Liberal Party’s Convention last November that Prime Minister Perry Christie said the government was convinced that the move will be beneficial to all concerned.
He reported that through diplomacy, the government was able to convince a majority of its private sector partners that moving the port was the best option.
The government plans to move all commercial shipping interests to a new $200 million port facility to be built near Clifton Pier in what the prime minister said was an environmentally appropriate area.
He projected that the port will be able to meet the commercial shipping needs of New Providence for the next 50 years.
“Soon, therefore, no more heavy trucks will be cluttering up the downtown area with all their noise, pollution, and unsightly appearance,” Prime Minister Christie said at the time. “All goods coming into the country by ship will enter through this new port in the west instead.”
The government expects that one result of the move is that the transformation of downtown Nassau would become reality.
While the prime minister said back in November that this would become effective “soon”, Dr. Bethel, who was not responding to anything the prime minister said, told The Bahama Journal on Thursday that shippers will not likely be removed anytime soon.
Following the prime minister’s announcement, operators of shipping companies questioned how the plan will work and how it will be executed. They have also questioned who will fund the $200 million facility promised by the prime minister.
On Thursday, some of them appeared no closer to answers.
Garth Rolle, who manages Tropical Shipping, said the government has indicated that the port is still in the initial planning stage.
“From the meetings we attended the government said that [it is] still doing studies to ensure that the area is environmentally friendly for the companies to relocate,” Mr. Rolle said.
“But as for a timeline we have not been given a deadline on when we will move because they are still in discussions.”
He said he is just waiting like everyone else to see if the companies will ever be relocated.
“The only thing we were told is that we would be relocated sometime in the near future, but when that will be nobody knows,” Mr. Rolle said.
Officials at other popular shipping companies, including Pioneer Shipping, Betty K. Agencies and Seaboard Bahamas, were also unaware of when their companies will be relocated.
They said since last year, there have been few meetings with the government to discuss the planned relocation.
Charles Klonaris, who chairs the Nassau Tourism and Development Board, has said that the transformation of downtown would result in the creation of a living waterfront that capitalizes on attractive harbour front views.
As mentioned, the move of the port is seen as a key element of this plan. For now, many businesspeople who would be directly impacted by the move are taking a wait and see attitude.
By: Bianca Symonette, The Bahama Journal
