By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Bahamas National Commission on Marijuana hopes to submit its final report surrounding the use of marijuana to the government in the first quarter of this year, according BNCM co-chair Quinn McCartney.

Speaking to The Tribune yesterday, Mr McCartney said the body is one step closer to fulfilling its mandate from the Minnis-led administration now that a national survey to gauge Bahamians’ feelings on marijuana use has been completed.

Describing the survey as “the final piece of the puzzle” for the group’s work, Mr McCartney said once the commission finishes its reviews of the survey’s findings, it will then include the information in a final report and submit it to the Office of the Prime Minister.

“The survey is completed and it would’ve been delivered to the commission earlier this year,” the BNCM co-chair said. “And we had a meeting last week to discuss it and the commission would’ve met with the representatives from Public Domain (the company which conducted the survey) to discuss the findings so they could give us an indication based on what the results are saying.

“So, all of the commissioners would’ve gotten a copy of the survey and the intent is for us now to review the results, look at it in depth and what the persons would’ve indicated and then compare it to what we presented in our preliminary report.”

He added: “And so, we’re now in the process of trying to construct the document to (merge) the two so that the relevant sections and their various subcommittees and they would be meeting as subcommittees to look at the survey’s results and see how that affects what they may have indicated in the preliminary report and then we’re going to (merge) those results into our final report to present to the government and prime minister of The Bahamas.”

In 2018, the commission was given its mandate by Cabinet to comprehensively examine issues surrounding the use of marijuana to chart the way forward on the substance.

After several extensions, the commission presented its preliminary marijuana report to Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis early last year, making recommendations for the legalisation of medicinal marijuana and the decriminalisation for possession of up to one ounce of the drug among other things.

It was expected that the final report would be submitted sometime late last year.

However, the BNCM’s work was placed on hold for more than three months as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Asked when the commission expects to present its final report to the Cabinet now that the group has since reconvened, Mr McCartney did not want to give a definitive timeline, but said the body hopes to do so within the first quarter of this year.

He said once the report is submitted, there will still be work to do.

“But there’s a lot of work to be done after we produce our report particularly in either direction the government is minded to move in. In any particular direction, there will be a lot more work to be done whether they’re looking at medicinal marijuana, or religious or recreational or expunging records, whatever,” he said.

“There will be a lot more work that would be done and so the commissioners may be available, or we may be called upon but that is entirely up to the government to determine if they will use our services beyond the (mandate given).”

Dr Minnis has previously said he supports decriminalising possession of small amounts of marijuana and making the substance legal for medicinal and/or scientific purposes, becoming the first sitting prime minister to publicly support some form of marijuana decriminalisation.

It is not clear what concrete steps have been taken towards marijuana legislation.

However, Attorney General Carl Bethel told The Tribune last July that a draft bill on the issue was expected to be presented to Cabinet “in very short order”.