The revelation by The Nassau Guardian last Wednesday that Hubert Ingraham had sought to convince Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC) to buy a minority stake in the Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) several weeks before the deal closed in 2011 has added new perspective to the debate over the controversial purchase.
It has also weakened the Free National Movement's (FNM) argument related to the whole BTC saga and has turned on its head FNM Leader Hubert Minnis' already feeble defense of the then prime minister and his administration over the BTC agreement.
Responding to the recent announcement by Prime Minister Perry Christie that his government has reclaimed just under two percent of the shares in BTC for the Bahamian people, Minnis said, "If the FNM made a bad deal, Christie has now made an even worse deal."
Speaking of the current administration, Minnis said, "What they did not admit was that the FNM got it right in the first place."
He added, "Their so-called new deal is nothing less than full confirmation of the integrity of the FNM's position."
Although he sat in Cabinet and there is such a thing as collective responsibility, it seems clear that Minnis had no knowledge that even the former prime minister had sought to change the pending arrangement with CWC to do essentially what the PLP had been promoting all along -- the sale of minority ownership in BTC.
For the FNM, and even many in government, The Guardian's revelation was surprising.
The government's lead negotiator for the BTC share take back, Franklyn Wilson, said while he was aware that Ingraham had a change of mind on what stake to sell in BTC, he had not seen the letter written by then CEO of Cable & Wireless Tony Rice to Ingraham.
One senior member of the FNM told us there was some disappointment in party circles that many had no knowledge of Ingraham's private maneuvers with CWC. He said had they known, they would have been able to better tailor their BTC talking points.
The FNM should be careful how it handles this matter of BTC. Clearly, many are speaking from a position of ignorance.
Its current chairman, Darron Cash, eloquently wrote publically against this deal.
Minnis is on shaky ground in his defense of it. It is clear he is speaking without the full facts of what transpired between the government and CWC in 2010 and 2011.
As we reported last week, Rice's March 2011 letter to the then prime minister spoke of a conversation the two had a day earlier and advised Ingraham that it would not be in the company's interest to agree to a minority shareholding in BTC.
Rice advised that the controversy over the matter could be addressed if CWC and the government agreed on "a PR plan of initiatives".
Additionally, he said CWC agreed to a "full and fair" price for BTC to "ensure that the transaction would be favorably received".
Ingraham's late bid to CWC came as he publicly faced strong opposition to a deal that to this day remains hugely controversial.
A source close to Ingraham at the time, who would only speak to National Review on condition of anonymity, said the then prime minister made a "sincere attempt to do a minority deal".
"I think he realized that he was going to pay a heavy political price," the source said.
He added that CWC would have dropped the deal had Ingraham pushed the issue of minority ownership for the foreign telecoms firm, and the government needed the money from the sale.
It seems apparent that Ingraham was in too deep to pull away from the deal at the last minute.
According to the letter from Tony Rice, it was already March when Ingraham asked CWC to consider buying 49 percent instead of 51 percent.
The government had already signed agreements with CWC.
On February 8, the government signed the agreements to privatize BTC and hand over 51 percent of the company to CWC through the transaction that required parliamentary and regulatory approval.
Ingraham soon tabled those agreements in the House of Assembly, saying that while CWC will have management control of the company when it takes over, the government will still have veto power over "critical" matters.
Not long after on March 20, 2011 the prime minister explained that the government decided to sell the majority stake in BTC because no company would agree to buy the minority share for a reasonable price.
"The truth of the matter is we could not find any international telecoms company willing to buy 49 percent," he said.
"We would have liked to have sold 49 percent. We couldn't. We had no one to buy it. If we could have, we would have.
"After all, that was our original intent."
At that point, the government was meeting extreme criticism over the sale.
BTC unions were staging angry protests. The opposition PLP was upping the temperature over opposition to the sale, and a broad section of society was publicly voicing objections over the deal.
It was an emotional time for the country and a tense time for Ingraham and his government.
Ingraham said at the time, "When the Free National Movement first put this out, we said we would sell 49 percent. And The Bahamas went to bid twice. We couldn't find an international company that was willing to buy at an acceptable price at 49 percent."
He added, "Since I couldn't find any telecoms company to buy less than 51 percent, I accepted the reality and agreed that we would sell to Cable & Wireless."
Ingraham said a strategic partner wants the certainty that it can control those business decisions that impact upon profitability.
"Purchasing 51 percent does this," he said.
It was clear that three years after the final attempt to privatize BTC, there was no turning back.
PROBE
On March 24, 2011, amid the heightened national tension, members of Parliament approved the deal.
Ingraham declared it was a "historic day in the history of The Bahamas".
In negotiating the BTC deal, he said the government was motivated by its desire to give Bahamians the best of what is available to ensure that communications services are reliable and accessible.
Although it now appears Ingraham himself was not happy with the final deal, his tone to the FNM's parliamentary caucus was firm and almost threatening.
He said if FNM MPs voted against the sale, a snap election would be called.
"If FNM MPs do no wish to vote for it and wish to repudiate that then we will say that we have said to the public of The Bahamas that we will do something that we are unable to do and we will return to the public of The Bahamas the power that you gave us so that you can decide who will govern you, because if you have a party that commits in its manifesto that [it is] going to do something, but is unable to do so because of the candidates elected, then you have a right to have a say in the matter," Ingraham said.
In Parliament, Ingraham accused the PLP of using the unions as "pawns" in the fight against the sale of BTC to CWC.
He criticized the leaders of the BTC unions for leading their members down "the wrong path".
The prime minister appealed to the unions to "engage with their new bosses". He told them that had they listened to him they would have avoided "thousands of dollars in court fees" trying to fight the deal.
This level of perceived arrogance further angered the unions which appeared weary from its bloody battle with the government.
After the revelation last week that even Ingraham in the final weeks of the BTC deal had pushed for a minority sale instead, President of the Bahamas Communications and Public Officers Union (BCPOU) Bernard Evans said he felt vindicated.
Although BTC debate fatigue has set in in some quarters, the publication of Tony Rice's letter to Ingraham and a new statement from Franklyn Wilson that the government netted less than $100 million for the deal highlight the need for the government to follow through on a probe of the 2011 agreement.
It is something Ingraham previously said he would welcome.
An important national asset was sold in 2011 and the bitterness and questions surrounding that sale persist to this day.
There are differing views on what impact the BTC sale has had on Ingraham's legacy. That is a matter for the political pundits to debate. Historians might offer conflicting perspectives.
What is more important is to air all matters associated with the sale.
The public has a right to know if indeed what Wilson and his negotiating team have concluded is accurate.
There could be important lessons to learn.
Perhaps such a probe could take us deeper into the thinking of Hubert Ingraham as he pushed forward with a sale it seems he was not entirely happy with.

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