So the very businesses that failed (decided or could not afford) to have any hurricane insurance coverage in place are now going to up to a $500,000 bank credit (overdraft) facility with Bahamian taxpayers on the hook for repayment of advances made to the businesses under these facilities if not repaid by the businesses themselves.

Hello Houston, we have a major problem here much like the Student Loan Program involving Bank of The Bahamas where taxpayers ended up getting the royal shaft. And down-and-out Bahamian taxpayers are about to get another royal shafting in the form of outrageously higher light bills from BPL. Just how many more royal shaftings do Tweedle-Dumb Minnis and Tweedle-Dee Turnquest think struggling Bahamian taxpayers can take?!

For decades now the National Insurance Fund (the Fund) has been raped, pillaged and plundered by PLP and FNM governments alike. We have Poodling, Hubiggity, Vomit and now Doofus Doc to thank for that simple fact. They each contributed greatly to the Fund being operated like a Ponzi scheme for the benefit of the political elite and their cronies, leaving it technically bankrupt and now strapped for cash to meet its obligations.

Increasing contribution rates and the level of pay subject to contribution rates is no longer a viable option for bailing out the Fund for three key reasons:

1) The ever increasing number of benefit recipients relative to the number of working contributors;

2) The huge chasm that has developed in our society between "the haves" and "the have nots", with the latter comprising the vast majority of the work force earning much less today on an inflation adjusted basis than previous generations since the introduction of National Insurance; and

3) The culturally ingrained and pervasive level of fraud, waste and mismangement that history has proven will never be stamped out under a PLP or FNM government.

The monies paid into the Fund were supposed to have been held in a fiduciary capacity, prudently invested and properly managed for the future benefit of the contributors. That did not happen and instead Poodling, Hubiggity, Vomit, Doofus Doc and successive NIB directors have all treated the Fund as a free-to-use cookie jar for the political elite and their cronies and friends.

For the above reasons, the Doofus Doc (Minnis) and his Incompetent Bean Counter (Turnquest) can be expected to soon announce that the National Insurance Fund needs to be bailed-out by the taxpayers to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, in much the same way that taxpayers have been and are still being forced to bail-out the bankrupt Bank of The Bahamas. Minnis and Turnquest will of course seek to employ a great deal of smoke and mirrors, special purpose vehicles and the like in order to bamboozle as much as possible the public's the required bail-out the technically insolvent National Insurance Fund.

Of course one of the key features of the bail-out will include a significant reduction in the future benefits of those working persons who will be saddled with the bail-out costs for persons already receiving benefit payments. Such is the very unfair price for working citizens of years and years of massive government corruption. I can just hear Tweedle-Dumb Minnis and Tweedle-Dee Turnquest blaming the need for a taxpayer bail-out of the National Insurance Fund on Hurricane Dorian. Dorian has become their go to excuse for any and everything these days.

LMAO - Sears and Smith both bear great responsibility for the unfavourable spot light constantly being shone on the Bahamas by global financial regulators. These two clowns also have close ties to the money laundering and other criminal enterprises operated by certain of the racketeering numbers bosses like that thug Sebas Bastian.

The French haven't had a decent political leader for decades now because of their very splintered and rigged political system. Things have gotten so bad that Paris is likely to loose, if it hasn't already lost, its long held standing as the most popular city in the world for tourists. Truth be told, France is a social and economic mess today.

Nothing but a self-serving political effort by Minnis to rewrite history. Those who were directly impacted by Dorian know exactly what did not happen in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Dorian and for many days thereafter. They were left with little or no help whatsoever from the defense force or police force. Thank God for the U.S. Coast and other foreign organizations and volunteers who immediately sprand into action. Meanwhile the Minnis-led FNM government did the only thing it was apparently prepared to do - standby and watch the emergency and relief efforts of the foreign organizations and volunteers on the ground in the hardest hit areas. Minnis's deceitful and shameful attempt to add political spin to what actually happened will neither change the facts nor the vivid horrifying memories and destitute feelings so many victims of Dorian are now living with for the rest of their lives.

Too late....the big time exploiting in Grand Bahama has already been done.....mainly by the political elite and the protected politically connected. LMAO

The very well known and dishonest Conville Brown.....say no more.

Let's just put a very high tariff rate on French champagne, French cheeses, and all French made luxury handbags, jewelry, etc. and be done with France one time. Better still, let's ban all Bahamians from traveling to France. We should also consider giving whatever moral and financial support that we can muster up to the Yellow Jackets in an effort to help them in their righteous quest to run looney-tune Macron out of France.

More money laundering and tax evasion takes place each year in France than has taken place in the Bahamas in the entire history of the Bahamas.

As a race we are our own worst enemy.