The mudslinging over which political party is corrupt took on new vigor over the last couple weeks with the release of a U.S. report on human rights practices in The Bahamas.
What the reaction has done more than anything is remind us just how disingenuous some politicians are -- on both sides of the main political divide.
In one of his first press releases since he was elected chairman of the Free National Movement (FNM), Sidney Collie sought to link the controversy over his former client, fashion mogul Peter Nygard, to the new report.
While saying that Bahamians are concerned by reported efforts by Nygard to buy influence, Collie declared, "It's no wonder the 2015 country report on human rights practices called out the government's ineffectiveness at implementing corruption laws".
Anyone who does not know better might think that the U.S. report has reflected something the Americans did not say while Collie himself was a Cabinet minister, and while the FNM was in office. A read of these reports going back years reflects similar observations by the Americans.
The 2015 report released recently pointed to "frequent reports of government corruption during the year". It highlighted that the procurement process was particularly susceptible to corruption. Regarding financial disclosures for senior public officials, it noted that there is no independent verification of the submitted data, and the rate of annual submission was weak, except in election years.
In 2010 when the FNM was in office, the U.S. report said "both political parties were subject to corruption allegations concerning the inappropriate transfer of government-owned land". It said, "The opposition party also charged the FNM government with corruption in relation to a controversial relocation of the container port".
Similar statements were made in the report a year earlier. The point here is that the "corruption" statements made by the Americans without any specific conclusions or outlining of evidence, are made in these reports every year. In fact, the information hardly changes. This is not to suggest that we should not take these observations seriously and that our officials do not have matters to address.
What a read of the reports shows is that any politician using any one year's report to try to point the finger at the party in office demonstrates an effort at gaining political points in a cheap and shameless way.
Collie, of course, was not pointing the finger at the FNM administration year after year when the same U.S. Department of State raised the issue of corruption -- neither was the now FNM leader, Dr. Hubert Minnis, also a former Ingraham-government Cabinet minister. If given a shot to sit in the big chair, he says, he would clean up corruption which he recently told The Tribune is endemic in Bahamian society.
He pledged that, if elected, the FNM would bring new anti-corruption laws and establish an independent agency with no ties to the Office of the Attorney General.
Minnis said the recently released report evidenced the Progressive Liberal Party government's record of putting its own interests first.
"We need proper anti-corruption legislation," he said in The Tribune interview, "with an independent agency properly funded with proper staff, with the legislative authority to do their job. The agency would report to an independent director of prosecution who will have no oversight by the attorney general, and possibly political interference. We need a new direction, and what we're seeing today we won't see anymore. Corruption is endemic in our society and it must change."
While Minnis pointed to the PLP's "record of putting its own interests first", we imagine from his silence that he was comfortable with whatever steps were being taken by the FNM to address corruption claims while it was in office and he was a minister. There was no alarm over corruption from the FNM when the United States outlined year after year reported corruption in the public sector.
More talk
Not to be outdone in the mudslinging efforts was Bradley Roberts, the PLP chairman, who at a PLP National General Council meeting on Thursday highlighted what he insisted were instances of corruption on the FNM's part. He suggested that while the FNM has over and repeatedly accused the PLP of corruption, it is the opposition party that is guilty of such.
We truly are exhausted by the back and forth on the issue. If the FNM becomes the next government, we would welcome any move by that administration to strengthen the current anti-corruption regime. But that must also include enforcement of the laws.
It is also not lost on us that it has been more than two years since our prime minister, Perry Christie, made his big anti-corruption speech in the Cayman Islands and has returned home without following up on the grand announcements he made. But we, of course, are not surprised. This is classic Christie.
Christie spoke at the UCCI/UWI Caribbean Conference on the topic, "Toward a Corruption-Free Caribbean: Ethics, Values, Trust and Morality", on March 20, 2014.
Christie said, "The Bahamas will likely introduce before year's end specific legislation dealing with anti-corruption in the form of either a new Prevention of Corruption Act or Integrity in Public Life Act. This new act will specifically implement the provisions of both the U.N. and Inter-American anti-corruption conventions, and create an Integrity Commission to supervise the administration of the act and oversee the process of public financial declarations."
The prime minister clearly was not talking about year-end 2014 in meeting those commitments. He also promised "renewed consideration" on the draft Freedom of Information Act "to allow citizens greater access to government information and to provide them with the tools to keep public administration transparent and accountable". We are told consultations are ongoing and no one knows when the bill will make it to Parliament.
In that same 2014 speech, Christie told his audience that the government was working on a national anti-corruption action plan which will build on existing initiatives, and include a renewed focus on quality leadership and in inculcating a sustained political commitment to fight corruption; the introduction of new specific anti-corruption legislation creating an anti-corruption body; improving public management systems and accountability service-wide, but with particular focus on strengthening the public procurement system, the office of the auditor general and enforcing a code of conduct and ethics for all levels of the public service and public administration, among other pillars.
These commitments all look good on paper and they all sounded good when the prime minister articulated them. But we have yet to see any meaningful action on these plans more than two years after his speech. When he comes up for air from his unrelenting smear campaign, perhaps Roberts might use his influence to urge action.
Candia Dames
Guardian Managing Editor
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