By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

NEWLY appointed Minister of Works Desmond Bannister said yesterday that recent social media rumours about his health were “stupid,” “immature” and “nasty” as he expressed eagerness to begin the work of beautifying The Bahamas through his new role.

Mr Bannister was sworn in as a Cabinet minister yesterday, a week after his other Cabinet colleagues received their instruments of appointment.

As unverified social media rumours about his health circulated last week, Free National Movement Chairman Sidney Collie said Mr Bannister did not attend last Monday’s swearing in ceremony because he had a pre-arranged commitment out of the country.

Asked about his well-being yesterday, Mr Bannister said: “It is stupid for people to be doing the kind of silly, immature things that they have been doing, put a lot of nonsense on the blogs. Bahamians know better. But what happens when you do that is you impact people’s family. I have a son and I have a daughter. My son is in California. You make people’s family panic, you make them call unnecessarily. It’s very nasty, it’s very unfair. I hope you get out of that kind of nastiness and I hope people in the media call it for what it is because you are the real media and don’t need to engage in fake news and you could do your investigative work, if you do that you’ll keep all politicians honest.”

With his appointment yesterday, Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis’ team of Cabinet ministers, parliamentary secretaries and senators are now intact.

Mr Bannister said “God willing,” both he and the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Works will be in office 7am today to get started on the work that must be done.

“Anyone who lives on this island can see the poor state of our island,” he said. “This is a beautiful island and country but we can’t leave it the way it is. Just driving along the road, we have too many lampposts that are leaning. Last night I drove out to the airport and half of the lights seemed to be off; I drove out this morning and two traffic signals were down; coming up Carmichael Road the light still wasn’t functioning properly. We’ve got to make sure that this island, this country operates properly for Bahamians. My function is to make sure that everything Bahamians expect to work are working and we will have an orderly society as much as possible.”

Mr Bannister served as minister of state in the Office of the Attorney General and later minister of education in the last Ingraham administration.