By FARRAH JOHNSON

HUNDREDS of people marched from the Southern Recreation Grounds to Rawson Square yesterday morning to protest the proposed 60 percent increase in value added tax and a new sliding scale tax on web shops.

At one point, rowdy protestors stormed barricades erected at Rawson Square and temporarily blocked traffic on Bay Street before being dispersed by police. The group included web shop workers, other disgruntled Bahamians, and some Progressive Liberal Party members and supporters. The tense crowd was just feet away from the House of Assembly, which was in session, and some members of government were greeted with angry chants and insults. 

The protest was labelled “Keep Ya Corned Beef, We Marching,” and was a venue for people to voice their frustration with the government’s 2018-2019 budget.

Protesters chanted and shouted over music from a mini brass band and waved signs, which were labelled: “When was the last time your water bill was less than $50?” “We thought it was the people’s time,” and “planes and washers duty free really?”

One protestor, B “Wheels’ Evans, said he was participating in the march to advocate for “rights and justice”.

He stated he has no faith in the current administration nor the opposition party because they have both proven to be dishonest and “disgraceful”.

“Bahamian people need somebody to look out for them. I don’t think either of these parties are interested in the Bahamian people, they’re just using them for when they want to get in (government),” he said.

“All they care about is votes. They look like they have some kind of other agenda, something secret we don’t know about, because don’t matter which one of them get in, it’s the same thing,” he said. 

Protester Charles Higgs said the proposed 12 percent VAT rate is “too much and too tough” for Bahamians, especially due to the large number of single parent homes in the country.

“The government isn’t even giving them quality food like fruits and stuff (on the zero-rated breadbasket list). They giving them this corned beef, and if you really did the history to know what corned beef is made up of, you wouldn’t even want it in this country,” he said.

Mr Higgs added the tax increase would force many families to make big sacrifices like removing their children from private schools.

“Perry (Christie) wouldn’t have done this on the people, I know he wouldn’t have done this,” Mr Higgs said. “Because when he was coming to do it...we didn’t even have to come this far…but Minnis, as he say he’s a doctor, he goes straight to the problem...but I think (with him) the problem is just kill you and you finish with it,” he said.

Another protester, Randy “Egypt” Rolle, thinks the tax situation has created “an atmosphere of economic apartheid,” similar to the oppressive racist regime that was employed in South Africa.

Kemalyn Resias, a manager for one of the Island Luck gaming houses, said she is married with eight children, and getting by is not easy.

“It’s not fair, it’s not right, and the government does not care about the people. It’s like they’re trying to put us back into slavery where we have to depend on the white man for everything,” she said.

Expressing her support for Island Luck CEO Sebas Bastian, she insisted Mr Bastian does a lot for the country, including providing jobs so people can “actually feed their children.”

“I am proud to be working for the boss I am working for because he is a Bahamian and he loves his staff. And now to push him to the backburner (so) that he has to lay off hundreds of his staff is not fair,” she continued.

Questioning why the gaming houses were being targeted, one of the march’s organisers Lawrence Harrison, stated: “They want to impose 50 percent (sliding tax) on the gaming houses, (but) what happen to the Royal banks? What happen to the Scotia banks? The First Caribbean banks?

“They are taking trillions of dollars over the years out of this country, and they ain’t doing nothing to it. A change has to come,” he said.

‘Oppressive’

Former senator and current talk show host Rodney Moncur was also present at the march, stating he was supporting the demonstration because VAT is an “oppressive tax for the poor and Negro entrepreneurs.”

“This is the first time in the history of the Bahamas that a budget debate has created this kind of national controversy, and this is the first time in the history where members of the governing party have made it quite clear that they are not going to support the budget,” he said.

“So there’s a political crisis in leadership and the polls have told us that overwhelmingly, the nation has no confidence in the FNM ...I don’t care if the PLP finds itself on the right side of history, the people’s side is the right side of history and the time has come for the PLP to be on the people’s side so there’s no sin in that,” he continued.

Operation Sovereign Bahamas Director Adrian Francis, whose group co-organised the protest, said it is obvious Bahamians will not wait until an election cycle to voice displeasure in the government and are upset at having increased taxes forced on them.

“The spirit that is on this country now is the same spirit just before the last election – just ring the bell – and to have that spirit over this nation in just one year speaks volumes,” he said.

When asked how he felt about assertions that the march was PLP sponsored, Mr Francis told The Tribune: “All through ‘We March’ was special interest groups, now that the Bahamian people start to march you know what they say? ‘Oh this PLP.’ That’s garbage, literal garbage.

“This is not a PLP march, this is not an FNM march, this is the people’s march. It’s the people’s time,” he explained.

The new VAT rate and increased taxes on web shops are set to go into effect on July 1.