The Leader of The Free National Movement (FNM) made a plea yesterday to the government to further educate the Bahamian public on the upcoming referendum.

Dr. Hubert Minnis said the people must be informed more thoroughly as to what each question means and what voting yes or no actually stands for in the January 28th referendum.

“I’m disappointed with the question. The question talks about taxation and regularisation. If you vote yes, you tax and you regulate. If you vote no, you don’t tax nor regulate,” he said.

“Which means presumably you continue as is and it’s just not fair to the Bahamian people,” he added.

According to Dr. Minnis, the first thing you should ask about is the legalisation of the web shops as that is what should be the key importance in this referendum.

The FNM leader also said the prime minister appears to all of a sudden have a change of heart, because it doesn’t seem as if he wants to give the public enough time to be educated.

“When we brought forth the referendum, his argument was that you needed six months of education. But suddenly he’s forgotten you needed six months then and now you only need three weeks today,” he said.

“They’ve been complaining about our educational system with regards to grade averages etc. But what has changed between then and now with us needing six months then and now we need three weeks today?” he asked.

Prime Minister Perry Christie announced back in December the date for the referendum and last week Dr. Bernard Nottage, minister responsible for elections announced the two questions that would be on the referendum.

All persons on the public registrar from the 2012 General Elections are eligible to vote.
The register remains open until Thursday, January 10th for any other persons interested in registering.