I like going to Fusion because it is air conditioned and you can get out of the house but I often wondered to myself how can they afford to pay the electric bill? It must be at least $100,000 a month.

The cost of electricity including back up generators due to the unreliability of BPL is the single largest drag on Bahamian GDP growth.

Businesses large and small, manufacturing and retail have been crushed and many have simply gone out of business.

We can't manufacture, assemble, freeze or keep anything cool in the Bahamas due to electricity cost.

This is by design. The culprits are a government / corporate duopoly, with ownership of power plants, electrical grid, shipping, imports, PPP's, Shell/Focol fuel importation monopoly and centralization of control over every single power plant in every island of the Bahamas. The entire infrastructure is run down, last century and above ground.

The government/corporate control group has frozen out small business participation in electrical generation and is only paying lip service to solar energy. And when they allow solar energy it must be sold to the power monopoly and prices are kept high for every citizen of the Bahamas.

This has eliminated the middle classes.

hi hrysippus

Ok, let’s do the math. Melissa is projected to have a direct hit on Aklins at 2pm Wednesday, population 692. High tides are at 12 noon and 12 midnight, rising about 3 feet. The low barometric pressure of hurricanes will cause the sea to rise at least 3 feet; the system is projected to generate between 2 and 3 feet of rain. On average the Bahamas is only a couple of feet above sea level.

All these flooding issues are before we consider hurricane winds greater than 70 mph. Not to mention rip tides washing everything into the ocean.

We have experience with this major flooding during Hurricane Dorian in Abaco and Grand Bahama. At its worst parts of Freeport were completely submerged under 10 feet of water. I think there are still bodies in trailers after 6 years.

It’s unclear to me what decision is there left for the Bahamas and the Prime Minister to make but to evacuate and house everyone that needs to in Nassau. A magnanimous offer from Atlantis, Baha Mar and Bahamas Air to spear head, transport and house the people of the Southern Bahamas in a major public private partnership to hedge against disaster would be a great decision. Let’s get going and not regret this next Monday.

Also the Bahamas has contingent reserves of $60 million just for this scale of operation.

Lundy, is it possible to see the Disaster Risk Management Departments evacuation policy and procedure for the Southern Islands? I see that the DRM is funded with $60 million including $17 million from dormant bank accounts of Bahamians and foreigners.

Specifically, how do we evacuate 2,093 people? Mayaguana/208, Inagua/856, Crooked Island/293, Acklins/692, Ragged Island/44. By plane or boat? And just when are we going to stop considering evacuation and make a decision? The winds and rains have already started.

So much talk, so much money, so little action.

I find little sympathy for what happened to Susan in the public domain and a heavy focus on the theft of food supplies which surely did happen. However there were Bahamian that were starving during Covid.

As Christians we are reminded of Christ's Parable of the Sower where most of the seeds were wasted but one out of four did fall upon fertile ground. What would have happened of the Sower did not plant at all because of the possibility that birds were going to steal the seeds? With no food the people would starve.

Susan and her NGO averted tens of thousands of Bahamians from starving to death during Covid. I know I donated as well. Then she was physically arrested her for theft and held in custody for 24 hours. 5 years later on the eve of Hurricane 🌀 Melissa the audit in a timely and mysteriously manner is suddenly tabled in parliament with no wrongdoing found and confirming that task force of NGOs and Government partnership achieved its objective and averted a national crisis.

We are now looking for NGO’s to assist the government in the aftermath of Melissa … any volunteers 🥺

Let’s focus on Cooked Island, Aklines, Mayaguana and Ragged Island which are directly in the path of Melissa.

If we can send a 737 to Jamaica why can’t we evacuate these islands which may be submerged like Abaco and Grand Bahamas during Dorian.

100% true bahamianson.

theft is now normalized and we now blame the victim. in this case why is BHS keeping cash on the premises and operating using cash.

about 20% of the economy is unbanked so cash is essential to do business in the bahamas.

why? b/c banking is not a right. if you don't have a work permit, don't want to pay VAT, don't have a business license, don't want to pay national insurance, don't want to pay for audits, file financial statements then you can't open a bank account .... so crime will continue at a high level

banks are making record consolidated profits of over $1 billion dollars yet the service is poor, everytime i go into a certain bank i hear horror stories of funds simply going missing on ppls accounts. some bank don't even have second tier authentication like a text reverification.

the government could care less. once their big foreign investors are pouring billions into their favorite projects and their boys get the private public partnerships in water, electricity, shipping, imports etc why should they care about the average bahamian?

ohhh, and all of their children have left the country to live in europe and north america and they have taken their money out of the country .... so there is nothing here for the poor ppl that can't escape

so crime is not surprising ...

Could the secret shoppers take pics of the unsanitary bathrooms at you know where supermarkets?

Maybe the Department of Health could check. If those bathrooms were in Canada the foodstoors would be written up immediately.

Also please check and take pics of the mold growing on berries.

have faith and believe Fred otherwise the policy makes zero sense.

Cubans make $1,000 a month and that’s 20% of their cost before housing and food allowance. Total cost of Cuban Nurse is $5,000 a month ($1,000 / 20%) plus $1,000 for food and rent.

So we are up to $7,000 a month or $84,000 a year.

We paying Bahamian nurses $24,000 a year …. they then go to the U.S. / their to make $60,000 a year.

No wonder Bahamians insist thier children leave. Ain’t nuttin here for da yuts dem.

i see no need to dig up the past problems of BoB

let dat rest

I think it is a good policy that all government employees are forced to bank with the government owned bank.

rbc, cibc, Scotia are owned by Canada and dividend most of their profits out of the country.

All the profits made by the BoB are reinvested into the government to generate more income for the country.

Also because we can't borrow money in the international markets due to our $13 billion in debt and ppl worry about if the government will default. Its better that the government borrow money from itself to pay in self.

If the BoB runs out of money due to the payroll the government can simply "bail it out" like it did the last time.

Also if the Webshops all Bank at Bank of the Bahamas then massive deposits at the bank can be used to finance the government payroll!

Webshops have been helping the economy and making massive contribution to the well being of the Country.

Boy the PLP is absolutely brilliant!