Since the Bahamian government’s recent announcement that exploratory oil drilling would be allowed prior to a referendum on the issue ...controversy has erupted along several fronts

The great oil debate

To drill or not to drill is the question

BY JUAN McCARTNEY
Guardian Senior Reporter
juan@nasguard.com

If Bahamas Petroleum Company’s (BPC) calculations are correct, there is a super-giant oil field lying beneath Bahamian waters.

All that needs to be done to get the nearly nine billion barrels of oil it believes is likely there, is to figure out exactly where it is, and go get it without spilling a single drop in the ocean.

If only life were that simple.

Since the government’s recent announcement that exploratory oil drilling would be allowed prior to a referendum on the issue, controversy has erupted along several fronts.

The referendum issue

Perhaps having had its reputation savaged in the gambling referendum in January, the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) had no wish to risk another fiasco and so opted to take a different route – see if any significant amount of oil is there, and then see how the Bahamian people feel about taking it out of the ground.

BPC maintains it will spud an exploratory well around this time next year, and the government says it will hold a referendum on the actual extraction of any oil in the latter part of 2015.

Yes, the PLP backtracked on its original promise, but is this not a considered, logical position to take in light of the fact that Russian companies are drilling for oil just miles away from our border with Cuba?

Not really, says Free National Movement Chairman Darron Cash.

In fact, Cash contends, it all seems a bit rushed.

“Given the national and international attention that the government knew this matter would receive, the minister of the environment (Ken Dorsett) should not have announced the government’s policy reversal until the proposed legislative changes and the regulatory framework could be disclosed at the same time. It is not constructive to the process that the debate has begun in earnest but there is an information vacuum,” he said last week.

“There is no information packet available, no statement of Government principles, no answers to frequently asked or anticipated questions, no secretariat and no readily available environmental impact studies.”

Cash, who may or may not be familiar with the Internet, is wrong that no environmental impact assessment has been made public.

It’s been out for a year, and the Bahamas Environment, Science and Technology (BEST) Commission has it on the front page of its website.

It’s over 400 pages long and extraordinarily detailed, but more about that later.

Cash is right however, about the lack of regulations and legislation being in place.

According to a letter BEST wrote to BPC Environmental Scientist Roberta Quant on February 15, 2012, there are no specific standards for gas and oil exploration in The Bahamas.

BEST deferred establishing those standards until widespread national consultation and a required regulatory review takes place.

Last week, Dorsett said new regulations to support oil exploration "are substantially complete" and will soon be presented to Cabinet.

It is expected that they would be tabled and debated in Parliament before ultimately going into effect before BPC begins its exploration.

That would be quite a step beyond where the Christie administration was willing to go with regard to the gambling referendum.

In the run-up to that debacle, Bahamians were simply expected to trust the government and the numbers houses’ good intentions with little detail.

Hopefully, Cabinet won’t make that mistake again.

Show me the money

Possibly years away from seeing any oil, Bahamians last week flooded talk shows and social media with the concern that somehow The Bahamas was getting the short end of the stick with regard to oil royalties.

That depends on how you look at it. According to the proposed production license, the royalties paid to the government increase on a sliding scale.

If up to 75,000 barrels of oil are produced per day (bopd), then the royalty rate would be 12.5 percent.

For oil production over 75,000 up to 150,000 bopd, the royalty rate would be 15 percent.

For oil production over 150,000 bopd up to 250,000 bopd, the royalty rate would be 17.5 percent.

For oil production over 250,000 bopd up to 350,000 bopd, the royalty rate would be 20 percent.

For oil production in excess of 350,000 bopd, the royalty rate would be 25 percent.

The royalty rate on any amount of gas production would be 12.5 percent.

BPC has five licenses that cover an area of nearly four million acres in total.

It is also required to pay the government $0.92 per acre per year for its leases.

However, these payments are deductible from royalty payments.

BPC is also surely ecstatic that there is no corporate income tax in The Bahamas.

It is unclear how value added tax would impact oil drilling and or production.

The company has invested nearly $50 million so far; mostly in seismic research.

It says an exploratory drill would cost another $120 million.

It is unclear what The Bahamas has invested so far, but preliminary indicators suggest that the country has spent nothing on BPC’s venture.

That seems like a pretty good return on investment.

However, when you look at what other countries rake in in pre-tax oil revenues, what is proposed would pretty much make The Bahamas the lowest recipient outside of Ireland.

Environmental concerns

The thing most people seemed to be concerned about is an oil spill.

BPC’s research indicates that an oil spill taking place at the location where drilling will most likely take place would have “a major impact on the Cuban coastlines in the vicinity of the release point”.

“Particular wind conditions may allow for transport of small quantities of oil to the west, where it can eventually be advected by the Florida current and potentially affect the Florida or eastern U.S. coasts, or the Western Bahama Islands.

“In case of a seabed spill, it is expected that some oil will surface at a distance from the initial spill due to intense deep dynamics along the Great Bahama Bank. This would favor a wide spread of oil, with possible impact further on the Cuban coast, but also on the Florida or Eastern U.S. coasts, or the Western Bahama Islands.”

BPC’s political ties

Though the PLP tries to downplay it, there is no getting around the fact that Prime Minister Perry Christie, Deputy Prime Minister Philip Brave Davis and Senator Jerome Gomez were all closely linked to BPC prior to the general election.

Davis was its lawyer, Christie a consultant and Gomez the resident director.

All three men have since said they no longer have ties to the company.

But that hasn’t stopped the FNM from asking serious questions.

The Opposition has asked for full disclosure. Davis has expressed annoyance at the line of questioning and pledged to act in the best interest of the Bahamian people.

Gomez addressed the issue last week, though both men stopped short of full disclosure.

Christie said he will address the matter in the House of Assembly today.

Whether there is oil underneath the sea remains to be seen, but what seems clear is that the great oil debate is just getting started.

March 18, 2013

thenassauguardian

Caribbean Blog International

Haitian-Bahamians and Bahamian Citizenship

Haitian-Bahamians Want Citizenship

The Bahama Journal




Three young Haitian-Bahamians stood before the Constitutional Commission this past Friday making recommendations specifically surrounding children born to Haitian parents receiving citizenship.

The trio, representatives from Univision, a civic organisation geared at spreading equality amongst cultures, presented the challenges that face children born to Haitian parents in The Bahamas.

President and Founder of Univision Lovy Jean said the Bahamian Constitution has no security for those children who for 18 years have no nationality.

“As stipulated in the Constitution, the group of young people born to foreign parents in The Bahamas is not afforded the right of automatic citizenship. Therefore a formal application must be made to the Department of Immigration for that person to become a citizen. That process is normally two to six years. If you’re lucky during a General Election you’d get it right away,” he said.

“You’re in this internal conflict because you don’t know where you belong. You can’t go to school, you can’t get a scholarship because you simply don’t have a nationality. In the schools down here, you’re not a Bahamian, your parents are Haitians. But back home in Haiti, you’re not Haitian; you were born in The Bahamas. So imagine what that must be like for someone to go through that for 18 years and more until they gain citizenship.”

Mr. Jean recalled the scholarship opportunities he had to pass up on all because he did not have a passport, Haitian nor Bahamian.

Mr. Jean’s sister, Janette Jean, is the co-founder of Univision and says she believes that it’s time The Bahamas begins to benefit from the investment it makes in the thousands of children it educates and provides free healthcare for.

“The Bahamas for the past years has been investing in its people, all because they want to see a better future. The Bahamas invests in both Bahamians and foreigners. The Bahamas invested in me, and they do it for a return. Sadly, because of the present laws and policies that we have currently in place, it is difficult for The Bahamas to gain the returns that they should in the foreigners that they invest in,” she said.

Undoubtedly the portion of their presentation that came as a surprise to the Commission was the group’s recommendation of setting a date, before which every child born in The Bahamas to foreign parents would become a Bahamian citizenship, and after which every child born in The Bahamas to illegal parents would be subject for deportation.

The group acknowledged that this method would not sit well with their fellow Haitians, but Ms. Jean believes that this would be the ideal way of addressing the illegal immigration problem in The Bahamas.

“We have an illegal immigrant problem. I consider The Bahamas my home and I want to protect it. This is a decision we have to make and the line must be drawn somewhere. You must be fair to both sides,” she said.

Their recommendation also included children born to parents outside The Bahamas, saying that the parents should be able to decide which nationality the child should be given as well as they recommended that spouses of Bahamian citizens of any gender be given the opportunity to apply for Bahamian citizenship regardless of their gender.

Department of Statistics’ 2010 census shows that there are 39,144 Haitians living in The Bahamas.

However, these figures do not include the undocumented or illegal immigrants.

18 March, 2013

Jones Bahamas

Caribbean Blog International 

What is the leader of the nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan Muhammad talking about?

By Dennis Dames:



The leader of the nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan Muhammad sounds like a cry baby and grouch – when he talks about suing The Tribune about a recent article entitled: Nygard Faces the Wrath of Farrakhan.

Minister Farrakhan was quoted as saying the following in Monday March 18, Nassau Guardian: They quoted my words perfectly, but the spin that was put on my words was vicious and ugly and very untrue.

I wonder what the esteemed Minister meant, when the following quote was attributed to him in The Tribune of March 15, 2013: “You know I’m a very simple man, my staff can tell you,” he said. “When I go, I come to do a job to teach my people what God has blessed us to have. I to teach them and go back to my hotel. I aint looking for sport and I’m not looking for play. So you can’t send no woman to me except to learn.” “And I don’t mean sex education,”…

Where did all of this come in, and what exactly was Minister Farrakhan alluding to?

Get a life big brother Farrakhan, and welcome to The Bahamas.


Monday March 18, 2013

Caribbean Blog International

The Opposition Free National Movement (FNM) has vowed to do everything in its power to block exploratory oil drilling in The Bahamas ...before comprehensive regulations are put in place ...and unless there is full disclosure of any relationship between the oil industry and senior Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) members

Opposition Calls For Full Disclosure On Plp Links To Oil

Tribune 242

 
THE Opposition has vowed to do everything in its power to block exploratory oil drilling in the Bahamas before comprehensive regulations are put in place and unless there is full disclosure of any relationship between the oil industry and senior PLPs.


And, with the government’s “rush to drill” – despite its own pre-election promises – FNM chairman Darron Cash claimed there were also worries the government was simply delivering a ‘favour to a financial backer’.

He said in a press release: “The FNM will use every means at its disposal to ensure that the first drill does not penetrate the sea bed until the appropriate legislative and regulatory frameworks are in place and until the Christie administration officials make full disclosure to the people.”

He said Prime Minister Perry Christie and Deputy Prime Minister Philip Davis both delivered services to the Bahamas Petroleum Company before they came to office, while a PLP candidate was the company’s local manager.

“Full disclosure must begin with Senator Jerome Gomez, former country manager for BPC, Deputy Prime Minister Philip ‘Brave’ Davis and Prime Minister Perry Christie, attorney and consultant, respectively,” Mr Cash said.

“Before these senior public officials vote on any issue regarding oil drilling, they must disclose to the Bahamian people everything related to their dealings with any oil or related company that requires approvals from the government to do business in the Bahamas.”

He said these men must disclose:

• terms and conditions of any contracts they had with oil companies

• how much they, their firms and other related parties were paid

• the duration of their contractual relationships

Prime Minister Perry Christie “seems incapable of designing and implementing public policy in a well thought-out and co-ordinated manner,” said Cash.

“The government has announced its intention to allow exploratory oil drilling ahead of putting in place the legislative and regulatory framework necessary to ensure transparency, safety and appropriate returns to the Bahamian people,” he added.

“The Minister of the Environment has given assurances that these are coming. But we must ask, why the rush?”

The move is reminiscent of the government’s “failed attempt to get approval from the Bahamian people” for web shop gaming.

Mr Cash said: “The government was rejected in that effort because of its failure to put in place the necessary legislative and regulatory framework to ensure accountability and transparency. History appears to be repeating itself. With oil drilling the stakes of incompetence in the Christie government are higher.

“While shortcomings in the web shop business may lead to reduced government tax revenues, lack of oversight and proper enforcement in the oil drilling business would be far more catastrophic, possibly leading to significant destruction of our fishing and tourism industries.”

Mr Cash added: “Prime Minister Christie would be aware from the General Election campaign that this is an issue of tremendous concern to the Bahamian people. In view of that, the FNM would have expected a well-considered and well-structured approach from the very beginning. As of now, the government’s haphazard approach has been enormously disappointing.”

Given the national and international attention that the government knew this matter would receive, he said, the Minister of the Environment should not have announced the government’s policy reversal until the proposed legislative changes and the regulatory framework could be disclosed at the same time.

“It is not constructive to the process that the debate has begun in earnest but there is an information vacuum,” Mr Cash said.

In addition to the government’s failure to present details of the legislative and regulatory framework, he said, there was no evidence that the structure to manage this public discussion had been set up within the Ministry of the Environment, he claimed.

There is no information packet available, no statement of government principles, no answers to frequently asked or anticipated questions, no secretariat and no readily available environmental impact studies, the FNM chairman said.

“For a debate of critical national importance that requires a wealth of information, the process is getting started in a completely backwards fashion. This could have been avoided.

“This begs the question – Why the rush? Again!

“In the interest of complete transparency, the Bahamian people deserve to know whether this action by the government is another act of payback to a financial backer of the PLP?

“While we are at the start of this process, the FNM wants the Christie administration to understand that the official opposition will not be a meaningful partner in this important national debate unless and until the members of the Christie administration with past and present ties to oil interests make complete and accurate disclosures of their past financial and other dealings with the principals of BPC and any related party or entity. This disclosure is non-negotiable.”

The FNM urged the Prime Minister to be “very proactive” in managing any public discussion on the issue of oil drilling.

“He would be well advised to outline a clear plan of action and an information/education campaign so that all stakeholders can be informed and then plan appropriately to have their voices heard on this important issue.

“The Prime Minister, as head of the government owes the Bahamian people this elevated level of transparency.”

Tribune 242

Caribbean Blog International

Prime Minister Perry Christie says that his government’s commitment to an oil referendum might have been miscommunicated

Christie defends oil exploration plan

PM explains decision on ‘research drilling’

BY TANEKA THOMPSON
Guardian Senior Reporter
taneka@nasguard.com

Prime Minister Perry Christie yesterday denied that his administration has flip-flopped on the oil drilling referendum.

He said it was never the intent to interfere with the relevant research needed to determine if The Bahamas has commercially viable oil reserves.

Christie said his government’s commitment to an oil referendum might have been miscommunicated.

“I think at all material times the question probably was not put properly and effectively, but the process was that we were not going to interfere with research and there was a distinction between industrial drilling and research,” he told The Nassau Guardian during the House of Assembly’s recess.

He added that if oil is found but the referendum is not successful at least the country would be informed about its resources.

“People will ask the question, ‘Why should I vote and I don’t even know if there is oil?’”

He also said if significant oil is found in this territory it would be a blessing, but whether that oil would be harnessed would depend on a public vote.

He said it has not yet been determined how revenue from oil drilling would be split between the government and the Bahamas Petroleum Company (BPC).

“If God has given The Bahamas oil in the quantities some people say exist, it would be an incredible bounty for our country,” Christie said.

“But we took a position that if there is going to be the exploitation of oil in The Bahamas, it has to be done with the consent of the Bahamian people.”

Yesterday, Free National Movement (FNM) Leader Dr. Hubert Minnis suggested the government’s stance on the oil drilling referendum has shifted.

Christie has repeatedly pledged to hold a referendum before any drilling is allowed.

However, on Sunday, Minister of Housing and Environment Kenred Dorsett said the government would allow the drilling of an exploratory well before a referendum, to determine if the country has oil in commercial quantities.

Cuba is currently drilling for oil in waters south of Guinchos Cay in The Bahamas.

Christie referenced Dorsett’s recent trip to Cuba to discuss this and said this underscored the need for The Bahamas to create a proper regime for any possible oil drilling.

Some have speculated that if Cuba finds oil near The Bahamas’ borders, this country may also have significant oil reserves.

“I am told that the Cuban wells might be an indication, but because our structures are different to theirs, they believe the structures in The Bahamas are structures that contain oil, whether light crude or heavy crude, but contain oil in commercial quantities,” Christie said.

“So that will only happen when the people will obviously be consulted as to whether or not we should move ahead and drill.”

Minnis, the MP for Killarney, said the government was flip-flopping on oil drilling.

He said strict regulations must be enacted before an exploratory well is dug to ensure that the environment is protected.

“It’s a very dangerous road to tread without having proper regulations in place,” he said.

“We’ve seen what happened in the Gulf [of Mexico]. For something like that to happen in The Bahamas, where 80 percent of our employment depends on tourism, whether direct or indirect, that can be a disaster for this nation.

“Our position [is] no drilling at all until all the regulations are in place to ensure complete safety so that the Bahamian marine resources, tourism, etc, are completely protected.”

On Sunday, Dorsett said he does not expect an oil referendum before the second half of 2015.

He said the exploration data needed to verify if the country has commercially viable oil reserves would not be ready until the end of 2014 or early 2015.

BPC was granted five licenses for oil exploration in April 2007, at the tail end of Christie’s first term as prime minister.

The company has reportedly invested more than $50 million in the country to date; however, most of that has been limited to 3D seismic testing or mapping.

March 12, 2013

thenassauguardian

Caribbean Blog International

The most fundamental characteristic of the modern Bahamas isn’t tradition, ambition, or national pride as we like to pretend... ...but rather shame

A Look Into The Shadows

“What happened to these masses, to this people? For forty years it had been driven through the desert, with threats and promises, with imaginary terrors and imaginary rewards. But where was the Promised Land?”

– Arthur Koestler, Darkness at Noon

 

 

By PACO NUNEZ

Tribune News Editor

pnunez@tribunemedia.net

 

 

 

THE pervasive sunshine for which this country is known casts deep shadows where over the years, poisonous secrets have accumulated.

 

So accustomed are we to our description in the vacation brochures – a welcoming, exuberant, God-fearing people – that even we have come to mistake this mask for our own face.

 

But under its official, picture-postcard skin, the Bahamas has a troubled soul.

 

It has become a place filled with pain, rage and despair. A place where the sunlight blankets the surface but does not penetrate.

 

And who are the people who live in these shadows?

 

They are the fatherless young and the mothers of dead children. Victims of sexual predation and hostages in their own homes.

 

They are participants in unspeakable acts, in a constant struggle to live with themselves.

 

People who spend their whole lives paying for mistakes they were never equipped to avoid.

 

They are the wrongfully condemned and the zealous executioners. The murderers and the next of kin.

 

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, it means you are one of the privileged few.

 

Thanks to wealth, status or just plain luck, so far you’ve been spared contact with the tide of destructive social forces that is shaping the modern Bahamas.

 

But it also means you’re in the minority, out of touch with where this country is really headed.

 

The unwelcome truth is that 40 years after Independence, we find ourselves farther than ever from the Promised Land which was promised to us then.

 

And, what do we really have to show for it but an arsenal of superficial explanations, skilful deflections and short-term remedies?

 

Very few are willing to soil their hands tugging at the roots of our deterioration; willing to remove the mask and look the truth in the face.

 

One such is Dr David Allen, for whom brutal honesty is a necessary ingredient in a workable solution.

 

The Bahamas, he says, is being taken over by an “ominous and pervasive culture of violence and destruction”.

 

Reporting on the findings of his research in 2010, he said: “We found a powerful sense of anger amongst us Bahamians. Throughout the three-year study participants talked about ‘outting’, which was the word for killing; poisoning – women particularly – and suicide.

 

“A few months ago we had a young girl commit suicide. We have five of her friends who want to do the same thing right now.

 

“Bahamians are saying I don’t feel the murders anymore; it’s just what is supposed to happen. They build a wall in their heart.

 

“In a group of 10 to 15 year olds, they don’t expect to live long. As a result (they think), you do what you can, get as much money, and then if you get killed or kill somebody, that’s it.

 

“Most disturbing is we found a number of young girls who had no compunction about giving their bodies for money. They pay for their education, but they also pay for their parents’ air conditioning, refrigeration and also their cable.

 

“The point is they had no feeling about it. They said, ‘Doc, that is what you call survival in the Bahamas.’ That was very, very disturbing.”

 

For Dr Allen, the difficult economic circumstances of the last few years did not beget an upsurge in crime and violence, as politicians like to claim.

 

Rather, material hardship unleashed forces that have been building in the shadows for more than three decades.

 

These forces were born and nurtured during the drug crisis of the 1980s, when more than two-thirds of the cocaine that made its way into the United States passed through the Bahamas, leaving in its wake a multitude of hopeless addicts and converts to the cult of easy money.

 

The toxins have been in our system ever since, slowly poisoning our sociocultural values, giving rise to ever more destructive behaviours and adding to the tally of silent victims.

 

The result is that the most fundamental characteristic of the modern Bahamas, the thing that really makes it tick, isn’t tradition, ambition, or national pride as we like to pretend, but rather shame.

 

We have become, Dr Allen says, a shame-based society, and the things we love to condemn in our neighbour – dishonesty, callousness, aggression – turn out to be necessary consequences of this fact.

 

Shame, he explains, is caused by “impacted hurt” – pain that has been trapped or blocked from being worked out along its natural course. Abuse that is swept into the corner, neglect that is hidden away.

 

“The shame response to this kind of hurt leads to self worthlessness, helplessness, hopelessness – depression and feelings of victimisation,” he says.

 

“We defend from intolerable shame through anger and a false self that is concerned with self absorption, ego gratification, revenge and aggressive control.

 

“This ultimately manifests as passive or overt aggression, and finally violence.”

 

He notes that nearly every person he interviewed who was involved in a serious crime had suffered some severe form of physical or sexual abuse.

 

One of his colleagues added that shame is “like a hot potato” – impossible to hold for long, hefted onto someone else at the earliest opportunity in an effort to seek temporary relief. And so the cycle of shame and violence is perpetuated exponentially.

 

If acts such as murder and suicide are not events but rather processes, it follows that to end the cycle of violence we must interrupt its progression before it manifests itself in action.

 

But if this is right, our after-the-fact, retribution based approach to justice is probably doing more harm than good – injecting even more anger and incentive for revenge into the cycle.

 

The same goes for efforts to stem the destructive tide with job creation, funding grants, and training programmes.

 

These are all helpful to an extent, but economics alone can’t heal shame.

 

Simply throwing money at the problem often does nothing but fuel a shortsighted and corrosive consumerism which itself arose as a strategy to conceal shame.

 

“Love is the antidote to shame,” Dr Allen says. “If we can apply love to the hurt, then we melt shame and stop the cycle of murderous rage and violence.”

 

His ground-breaking strategy for doing so, “The Family”, is named after what he believes was one of the most calamitous casualties of the drug years – the stable two-parent household.

 

The group has been running for six years and now has around 60 adult members, the majority of whom simply walked in one day feeling compelled to unburden themselves of the pain that was threatening to consume them.

 

A guest at their weekly meeting last Wednesday, I was profoundly moved not just by their testimonies of suffering, but also the disarming atmosphere of openness and honesty.

 

In a culture that has become dominated by self-denial, where everyone wears a disguise, I witnessed people giving voice for the first time to deep anxieties, profound hurt, closely held secrets.

 

And I watched them being welcomed with sympathy and understanding into a group of fellow travellers; into an organically developing support system in which positive emotions like gratitude and benevolence can flourish; into a Family.

 

The group is at once a microcosm of the problem – the full range of torments that afflict our people is represented – and a testament to the solution.

 

Dr Allen’s impressive results speak for themselves. But the programme as it stands is far too small to hold back the tide on its own.

 

So the real question is, do the rest of us have the courage to support his efforts?

 

Are we capable of facing up to what we’ve become, or will we continue to pretend that all’s well in the land of sun and sea, hoping thereby to attract sufficient tourist dollars to paper over the cracks?

 

 

What do you think?

 

Email questions or comments to pnunez@tribunemedia.net, or join the conversation at: http://www.tribune242.com/news/opinion/insight/

 

March 04, 2013

 

Tribune242

 

Caribbean Blog International

 

The Bahamas 2010 Census Report provides innumerable opportunities for government agencies, private researchers ...and the general public ...to better understand our Bahamas

The Bahamas in numbers

The Nassau Guardian Editorial

Our census, a vital and complicated undertaking, describes the identity of The Bahamas through numbers.  It is also indicative of trends and analysis of data based on successive census reports.

For The Bahamas this not only means comparison on a regional scale, but also between our islands.  Remarkably, this is the 19th decennial census to be conducted in The Bahamas.  Early census counts are not likely to be comparable to recent data due to likely discrepancies in survey methods, but they nonetheless provide value to the history of The Bahamas.

Interestingly, the census report makes note of the first census in 1722 whereby 74 percent of the population was white and 26 percent black, compared to the 2010 census whereby 91 percent identified themselves as black, five percent white, and two percent as of mixed race.  Such an extreme reorientation of the racial makeup of a country identifies the need to reexamine assumptions about who we are.

Population statistics are perhaps the most widely recognized outcome of a census.  For those living in New Providence, it is all too obvious that the island accounts for 246,329 people or 70 percent of the total Bahamian population.  With an additional 35,497 people since 2000, it is all too apparent that the roads are more congested, lines a bit longer and the housing prices just a bit higher.

But herein lies the importance of data availability.  While New Providence may have experienced the greatest increase in people, several other islands had a much higher percent change in population growth – take Abaco, which experienced an increase of 4,054 people or nearly 31 percent to a population of 17,224 compared to 2000.  Though such an increase would be nominal for New Providence over 10 years, in Abaco the additional people stress local infrastructure from power generation to road maintenance.

The Bahamas’ greatest challenge is providing and maintaining basic infrastructure across the populated islands.  Even with all the controversy, Abaco needed a new power generating facility and still suffers from countless power failures.  While the population congregates in New Providence, growth and a retraction of growth on some islands must guide government expenditure and planning.

Likewise, the government must accept the diversity of residents living in The Bahamas and amend its immigration policies.  Seventeen percent of the population claims citizenship elsewhere, the majority or 64 percent were from Haiti.  Though the census claims to account for residents regardless of immigration status, it is difficult to imagine that the census was able to account for all residents of known Haitian communities such as those found in Abaco.

The Nassau Guardian has reported on specific data tables such as Internet access and usage, health insurance and access to toilets at private dwellings.  There are numerous other tables where trends can be extrapolated on for use in education planning, the looming retirement of baby boomers and their future healthcare needs, marriage trends and reproduction rates.

A copy of the Census 2010 Report became publicly available online on Monday, October 15.  Such data provides innumerable opportunities for government agencies, private researchers and the general public to better understand our Bahamas.

March 07, 2013

thenassauguardian editorial