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The Bahamas - Politics

The history of Bahamian independence is not only the story of a colony breaking away from its mother country. It is also the account of how a political party and nationalist movement, the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP), achieved the peaceful transfer of political power from a white elite — the local allies of the colonial power — to an independent black government.

For decades, the white-dominated United Bahamian Party (UBP) ruled The Bahamas, then a dependency of the United Kingdom, while a group of influential white merchants, known as the "Bay Street Boys," dominated the local economy. In 1953, Bahamians dissatisfied with UBP rule formed the opposition Progressive Liberal Party (PLP). Under the leadership of Lynden Pindling, the PLP won control of the government in 1967 and led The Bahamas to full independence in 1973.

A coalition of PLP dissidents and former UBP members formed the Free National Movement (FNM) in 1971. Former PLP cabinet minister and member of Parliament Hubert Ingraham became leader of the FNM in 1990, upon the death of Sir Cecil Wallace-Whitfield. Under the leadership of Ingraham, the FNM won control of the government from the PLP in the August 1992 general elections. The PLP regained power in 2002 under the leadership of Perry Christie. The FNM, again led by Ingraham, returned to government by capturing 23 of the 41 seats in the House of Assembly during the May 2007 election; the PLP won 18 seats.

In July 2008 Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham announced changes to ministerial portfolios and the creation of two additional ministries--the Ministry of Youth, Sports, and Culture and the Ministry of the Environment.

The general election on 07 May 2012 resulted in a victory for the opposition PLP and a change of government. Prime Minister Perry Gladstone Christie took office on May 8 after defeating the FNM party led by former prime minister Hubert Ingraham. Christie had previously served as prime minister from 2002 to 2007. The PLP won 29 of the 38 available parliamentary seats, with 48 percent of the popular vote. The FNM won the remaining nine seats.

Although the PLP won a significant majority of seats in Parliament, the final vote tallies had a difference of just over 10,000 votes between the two primary political parties. For the first time, the election included an effective third political party, the Democratic National Alliance (DNA), which fielded candidates in each of the 38 constituencies. Despite capturing nearly 10 percent of the vote, the DNA failed to win any seats. Ingraham resigned his seat shortly after his party lost the elections in May, and a PLP candidate won the seat in an October by-election, bringing the total PLP parliamentary seats to 30.

In advance of the elections, the Ingraham government revised its electoral legislation to allow official election observers to participate in the electoral process for the first time. Election observers from the Organization of American States (OAS) and foreign embassies found the May elections to be generally free and fair. After the May 2012 election, the FNM and some media alleged that persons associated with that party were “victimized” when they were dismissed from government jobs shortly after the administration change.

The principal electoral law contains no provisions covering campaign contributions, nor any prohibition of financing from foreign and/or anonymous sources. As a result financing of political campaigns is generally considered an entirely private affair between party candidates and their contributors. The OAS electoral observation mission reported that this system, in which campaign finance is entirely of private origin and essentially unregulated, has the potential to affect the equity of electoral competition.

The OAS stated that such a system also exposes the country to the possible infiltration of illicit funds into politics. The lack of reporting requirements for political parties, combined with the fact that the legal framework does not endow the electoral authority with supervisory functions in the area of political financing or delegate this function to another organism, leads to a deficit of accountability in the area of political financing. The OAS also reported concern over the absence of guaranteed access to information on campaign spending, which leads to a lack of transparency with a potentially negative impact on the ability of voters to make informed decisions.

The Public Disclosure Act requires senior public officials, including senators and members of parliament, to declare their assets, income, and liabilities on an annual basis. The declaration applies to spouses and dependent family members. The government publishes a summary of the individual declarations. In practice there is no independent verification of the submitted data, and the rate of annual submission is weak except in election years. All 133 candidates in the May election submitted their financial statements as required.

Following the October 2012 by-elections, former prime minister Ingraham publicly accused Prime Minister Christie and the PLP of bribing voters. The PLP also accused Ingraham and the FNM party of granting multimillion dollar development projects to Family Island constituencies in an effort to garner votes in the lead-up to the May parliamentary elections. Both the FNM and PLP were accused of accepting campaign contributions from illegal online gaming businesses.

Voters in the Bahamas headed to the polls on 10 May 2017 in a hotly-contested general election overshadowed by corruption allegations and rising unemployment. The election pits the party of Prime Minister Perry Christie, a veteran politician from the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP), against his main opponent, Hubert Minnis of the Free National Movement (FNM), a physician. Minnis campaigned on a platform of change, seeking to implement term limits on the prime minister and promote "Bahamian ownership in the economy," according to his website. The election was overshadowed by the long-delayed opening of a $4.2bn mega-resort called Baha Mar.

Critics of the 73-year-old Christie, who was finishing his second non-consecutive term as prime minister, said the time has come for him to retire. Christie prompted condemnation earlier this year when he denied corruption accusations by raising his middle finger to reporters.

The elections were conducted May 10, 2017 during which the Free National Movement won 35 of the 39 seats contested to form a new government. An Advanced Poll was held May 3, 2017. Parliamentary Registration Department officials say 88 per cent of the 181,000 registered voters in The Bahamas cast ballots during the General Election.

A preliminary report from the Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) Election Observer Mission has given The Bahamas high marks for the conduct of the 2017 General Election. Parliamentary Commissioner (Actg.) Charles Albury said that officials at the Department had received a preliminary report from the CARICOM Election Observation Mission with respect to the conduct of the 2017 General Election, effectively congratulating The Bahamas on the conduct of the elections in many instances, while offering recommendations for improvement in others.

Commissioner Albury said Mission Observers, who visited 223 Polling Stations throughout The Bahamas, observed that polls opened on time in the majority of polling stations; that most of the stations were fully staffed and that the majority of those polling stations had at least two agents present representing the two major political parties.

The Observers also found that the polling stations were conveniently located in the majority of cases and easily accessible to voters including those with disabilities. The Mission further observed that the materials and supplies on hand at most of the polling stations were available in the required quantities and that adequate security was in place at all locations with the officers conducting their duties in a professional manner, which they felt contributed to the level of calm that prevailed during the voting process.

The FNM - which not too long ago was seen as a basket case - was now in full control after the biggest win in Bahamas' electoral history.