Arawak Cay port development: A port Perry Christie cannot change

A port Christie cannot change
tribune242 editorial:



OPPOSITION Leader Perry Christie must have been in jesting mood when he threatened would-be investors that he would reverse any agreement signed with the Ingraham government that would locate the $65 million container port at Arawak Cay.

And to put the final seal on the threat, he declared that he was the person who would win the next general election. We pause here to suggest that were the PLP to win the 2012 election, Mr Christie, as leader, would be taking the Gordon Brown exit through the back door. We certainly never expect to see him prime minister again.

However, we all know that were he to try to change this agreement, before he could complete the first pirouette of the Christie shuffle he would be so buried in law suits that he would not be able to dig his way out -- nor would his followers be able to dig their way in to find him.

And now that Prime Minister Ingraham has secured the agreement with so many iron hoops, any hope of Mr Christie changing one tittle is no longer in the realm of possibility. It is as foolish of him to have made those threats as it was of Paul Adderley, many years ago on behalf of the PLP, to threaten Sol Kerzner that should Mr Ingraham lose the 2002 election he would have to renegotiate the Paradise Island agreement with the PLP government. The PLP lost the election. The Paradise Island resort was built in record time and became the catalyst that revitalised this country's tourist industry. Seeing Mr Kerzner take the plunge in a country written off as bad news, many substantial investors -- not drug kingpins as happened under the PLP-- followed. It was the turning point that led to this country's comeback.

"No successor government likes to contemplate having to renegotiate its predecessors' agreements, even bad agreements particularly with foreign investors," Mr Adderley told Mr Kerzner. "But this agreement is so bad, so exploitive -- that every Bahamian, including those who still support the Prime Minister together with the international finance community, would applaud a renegotiation."

We don't know who he thought he was fooling with such bombastic words and bullying tactics, but it was all a bunch of nonsense. All those who supported Mr Adderley in such puny thoughts, should turn their heads in shame today as they pass the Atlantis resort, a resort that saved this country's bacon during its rejected years. Mr Christie could not have been one of their number at that time because for the five years that he headed the Bahamas government it was openly talked that his one ambition was to leave the BahaMar resort on Cable Beach as his legacy to match Mr Ingraham's legacy -- Atlantis, Paradise Island. However, he missed the mark because of his indecisiveness -- as usual he had not signed the final agreement when time came for the changing of the guard.

And now to talk of relocating the container port when, according to him, he becomes prime minister is really a pathetic joke.

He says that given a second chance, he would move the port to his and his party's preferred location on the island's southwestern shores.

At the time that the 2005 Environmental Impact Assessment study was completed for the proposed commercial shipping facilities, the PLP government made the public believe that the southwest Bahamas was the location recommended by the independent advisers. It was only after the PLP was removed from the government that it was discovered that the public had been told a half truth.

As Tribune Business pointed out in an article last year, "based on the criteria employed by Coastal Systems International's assessment team, Arawak Cay scored 12 points, compared to the southwestern port site's 10 points on environmental impact. Where Arawak Cay rated especially high was on the minimal impact to the terrestrial environment and water quality."

However, Arawak Cay lost out because it did not fit in with the Christie administration's preferred site for its long-term master planning. That master plan took in a wide sweep of the southwest, where all kinds of developments, including private, had been planned. This excluded Arawak Cay.

Anyway, the guarantee of a 20-year exclusivity period for the Arawak Cay port development makes it impossible for Mr Christie or any other government to contemplate a change of venue.

The agreement is made exclusive for a 20-year period for not only all of New Providence and Paradise Island, but also within 20 miles of the shoreline and any other port for the landing of containerized, bulk or break bulk cargo or vehicles.

Anyway, Mr Christie's little joke was a good laugh while it lasted.

May 14, 2010


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