Statement from the Leader of the Opposition on PLP attacks by the Prime Minister at FNM Rally on 22 January 2020:
Our internal polls reveal universal disdain and condemnation for what transpired with the Prime Minister last night.
With a struggling economy and a public purse under extreme pressure to meet government expenses, the Prime Minister clearly deceived the entire nation under the guise of a government sponsored Town Hall Meeting only to further fleece Bahamian tax payers into funding an FMN rally.
This is a corrupt use of public resources.
The Prime Minister admitted that the meeting was the launch of his re-election political campaign.
That meeting last night therefore must be paid for by the FNM party, not the Bahamian tax payer. We however have zero confidence that the Prime Minister has the decency or integrity to do so.
His intoxication with and abuse of power coupled with his despotic mindset know no bounds and Bahamians everywhere now fully understand that they must remove him from office with the power of the ballot to bring an end to this madness.
As for the Prime Minister’s charge that the PLP wants to return to power to clean out the treasury, Bahamians everywhere could see that the FNM has already done that. Pray tell, what will be left when the PLP gets there?
By their own admission, there is no money in the public treasury and the constant and unsustainable borrowings prove this. The treasury is already clean so the PLP already knows we will meet no money in the public coffers.
However, and unlike the FNM, the PLP will implement initiatives to improve government revenue performance and use that revenue to bring relief and to uplift the lives of all Bahamians.
We did it before and will do it again.
We say again that the national budget is principally for benefit of all Bahamians and not to line the pockets of the wealthy few.
This FNM government has been spending the people’s money like drunken sailors ever since assuming office with billions borrowed, unconscionable tax increases, tax breaks for the rich and politically connected and a number of poorly executed deals.
The Grand Lucayan remains closed and subsidized by the tax payers.
The fire destruction of power generation plants at BPL has cost Bahamians hundreds of millions of dollars in addition to higher electricity bills.
The Shell and Wartsilla deals remain suspicious, cloudy and shrouded in secrecy.
The sharp increase in government’s travel budget and travel allowances is another ill-advised policy that is a further drain on the public treasury.
The shot spotter technology is not effective. Graphic photos, videos and descriptions of crime scenes are routinely posted to social media and go viral long before the government responds to the reported crime.
The government has absolutely nothing to show for the 60% hike in VAT and higher gaming taxes as there are no hospital beds; no medicine in the hospitals; no teachers in the schools; crumbling infrastructure all around us; post hurricane repairs are stagnant; contractors and vendors still cannot get paid; university students are returning home because the government has failed to pay their scholarship tuition and the government had to recently borrow funds as much as four times in one fiscal year to meet its payroll.
This is the Minnis legacy at a glance.
All indications are that the Minnis government has already cleaned out the treasury and the cupboard is in fact bare as Peter Turnquest once put it.
