By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

ISLAND Luck CEO Sebas Bastian said the government must do more to ensure that the banking industry is owned by Bahamians and not foreign lending institutions. His comments came when he was asked to respond to a recent statement by Foreign Affairs and Immigration Minister Fred Mitchell, who last month questioned if the new Banks and Trust Companies Regulations (Amendment) bill will allow web shop owners to petition the Central Bank for permission to launch their own lending institutions.

“The banking system was created to promote saving and investing and what we see happening today is the opposite of that,” Mr Bastian said in a recent interview. “There’s no incentive to save and there’s definitely no access to investing through the banking system.

“So Fred Mitchell is spot on in his plea to ask the Central Bank to consider promoting more financial institutions owned by Bahamians. It can no longer be ignored.”

He added: “Bahamians are falling victims to the profit of these banks in a time when we need them the most. But they are too busy laying off Bahamians and finding false reasons why they should or should not do business with us (web shops) when the truth of the matter is it’s not really about the ‘what’ it’s all about the ‘who’.

“The government of the Bahamas must protect the sovereignty of our nation, we must defend it at all costs, and the only way to do that is to provide the Bahamian people with the opportunity and access to take back these industries that are dominated by foreign interest and so we can really own our Bahamas once and for all.”

The Banks and Trust Companies Regulations (Amendment) Bill is expected to “tighten” the Central Bank of The Bahamas’ oversight and bring The Bahamas into full compliance with international banking’s best supervisory practices.

It also seeks to enhance the powers of the Central Bank to ensure that the issuance of shares to a new or existing investor, or an increase in their equity holdings as fit and proper, and that the institution continues to be managed prudently.

Last month, in making a contribution to the Bill in the House of Assembly, Mr Mitchell questioned whether it would pave the way for web shop owners to petition the Central Bank for permission to launch their own lending institutions.

Mr Mitchell said: “We know in the run up to the passage of the gambling legislation what the difficulties were for those in that sector to be able to bank the large sums of capital that had been accumulated by their own entrepreneurship.

“The question is now that they have these large sums of capital accumulated, would this group of people with these large sums of money be able to apply to our Central Bank under these provisions and meet the fit and proper test be able to form a bank? (They) would be able to do what they are now doing as volunteers through a Bahamian bank. We have been trying at this for a long time.”

Last month, Mr Bastian launched OWN Bahamas, a programme created to promote economic development and designed to support the acceleration of the Bahamian economy.

The programme offers grant funding to people lacking the capital to start a business independently.

At the time, he said: “OWN wants to be that bridge between people’s goals and dreams and providing the opportunity to achieve just that. We want to basically really own this country, and the only way we can do that is if we empower young Bahamians, encourage them to think outside the box, expand their investment appetite beyond the conventional types of businesses that we see in The Bahamas like our beauty salons, car wash and 99 cent breakfast stands.”