Dear Editor,

The gold rush administration is between a rock and a hard place. During the electoral campaign back in 2012 its leadership cadre, sycophants and political allies said that they had the solutions to all national problems, inclusive of being able to fix the economy. All the PLP wanted was an opportunity to govern again. The party was returned to office big time.
Fast-forward to 2013. A badly managed opinion poll, dressed up like a referendum, was soundly defeated by an ill-informed and apathetic electorate. The PM's pronouncement that he had no horse in the race was a deathblow to the possible success of the same. Strike number one.
The party also promised to introduce a modified form on National Health Insurance within its first year in office, having had an opportunity to extensively research the feasibility and ramifications during its 2002 to 2007 term in office. Sixteen months later, the plan has been relegated further down the road and is not likely to see the light of day anytime soon. Strike number two.
Now the administration is faced with a looming fiscal crisis and possible economic downgrade by various international credit rating agencies. Successive governments, especially the last Ingraham administration, racked up debt and spent taxpayers' money like dirt. We are now saddled with a declared debt in excess of $6.5 billion and counting. The annual deficit exceeds $500 million, if not more.
To dig its way out of this fiscal hole the gold rush administration has proposed the introduction of a value-added tax regime, complete with a new level of bureaucratic support and an enforcement arm. In the majority of regional nations where VAT has been introduced and implemented their economies have gone south and debt servicing consumes in excess of 70 percent of GDP (gross domestic product). If you wish, refer to Barbados as a classic example of a failed economy which is burdened down with a VAT regime.
There are any number of creative ways through which this administration would be able to claw its way back to fiscal stability without imposing a knuckleheaded, unworkable and badly thought-out replacement tax regime.
The administration has rolled out several individuals, who really should know better, to act as propaganda fodder, in the form of Ishmael Lightbourne and one John Rolle. The former is a former senator within a former PLP administration and the latter is a big honcho at the Ministry of Finance and an academic to boot.
Lightbourne is a noted chartered accountant and has some private business experience. Rolle, I believe, is a career civil servant who has never operated or managed even a petty shop. This is not to suggest that they might not know what they are talking about, but the administration is dead wrong on this issue of VAT.
The gold rush also rolled out a former prime minister of Barbados, Owen Arthur. He was brought in to opine on the benefits of VAT. He did not tell his restricted audience in Grand Bahama, however, that under his watch (he served as PM of Barbados for three terms) his nation went from a surplus to a massive deficit. In fact, Barbados tried to float a $500 million bond issue the other day and was unable to get a single dollar on the international market.
An income tax, at a flat rate of 10 percent , across the board, coupled with a sales tax of four percent to five percent and an aggressive collection policy on overdue existing taxes would wipe out the national debt at the stroke of a pen. The gravy would come when this administration promulgates legislation to regulate and tax the so-called web shop industry.
It is interesting that the Bahamas Christian Council and its self-appointed leadership of potentially political bootlickers have come out in support of VAT. Will VAT be applicable to church collections and the income from tithes and love offerings? That council is infested with theological bloodsuckers of the highest order.
The Bahamas Christian Council appears to have no problem with yet another tax being imposed upon the collective backs of the poor and middle-class Bahamians but are bitterly opposed to the regulation and taxation of the web shop industry. Gaming by Bahamians, regardless of the shape or form thereof, is not going to just go away. I often wonder just where the council's head is. I have a good idea but will not opine at this time.
The PLP will lose the goodwill of the business community and the political support of its traditional bases over this vexing issue of VAT, mark my words. Perry Christie is being ill advised and, clearly, he does not have a grip on what to do with the economy.
It is most unfortunate, however, that people and politicians like Christie & Company, will never be subjected to the harsh realities of VAT or any other form of taxation as most of them, inclusive of the PM, are set for life. VAT will be the hangman's noose for the PLP.
I now appeal to the DPM to urge the hapless minister of finance to step back from the brink. Davis has a date with destiny as the next logical PM of The Bahamas and he can ill afford to permit the stillbirth of his ascendancy by bumbling colleagues.
To God then, in all things, be the glory.

- Ortland H. Bodie Jr.

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