Leaders of the environmental organization Save the Bays (STB) said despite their perceived political connections to the Free National Movement (FNM), they still intend to hold the FNM’s feet to the fire.
Save the Bays leaders said after the FNM swept the general elections in an historic vote, winning all, but four seats in a 39-seat House of Assembly, they offered their congratulations, but urged attention to what it called “promises Bahamians want fulfilled as top priorities.”
Chief among those, said Save the Bays leaders, was delivering on a long-awaited Freedom of Information Act that would enable Bahamians to know the country’s business.
In a statement, the leaders said their organization also wanted to see continued interaction with civil society and commitment to public consultation, serious attention to electoral process reform, including campaign finance, passage of a comprehensive Environmental Protection Act, an end to unregulated development and equitable handling of crown land applications with priority given to Bahamians.
The group added that while their priority is environment and sustainable development that does not trample on the rights of long-standing Bahamian communities.
Save the Bays wants this government to know, just as the former government knew, that they are, in many ways, the watchdog for the many whose voices are silenced by fear of victimization and they will continue to hold everyone’s feet to the fire.
Save The Bays lawyer Fred Smith, earlier this month in a video circulating on Facebook, said he was most certainly financing the FNM’s campaign.
In case documents filed on April 13, Save the Bays Director Joseph Darville said the government’s public statements towards the group became acrimonious in the wake of its harassment civil suit against Peter Nygard and lawyer Keod Smith, and further intensified with the tabling of Save the Bays private emails in Parliament.
The disclosures came as part of a fierce political debate over claims included in the alleged murder-for-hire plot outlined in court documents in March 2016.
At the time, former Minister of Education Jerome Fitzgerald accused Save the Bays of being a political organization seeking to “overthrow” the Progressive Liberal Party government under the guise of an environmental group.
During his contribution in the House of Assembly, Mr. Fitzgerald read private emails from Save the Bays members and others, which he said bolstered his claims.
For his part, former Minister of Foreign Affairs Fred Mitchell claimed that some $8.25 million has been filtered through various organizations connected with Save the Bays – locally and internationally – from 2013 to 2015.
