FROM LEFT: The FNM’s new Deputy Leader Shanendon Cartwright, Leader Michael Pintard and new Chairman Dr Duane Sands on stage at the last night of the convention. Photo: Donavan McIntosh/Tribune staff
By RASHAD ROLLE
Tribune Senior Reporter
rrolle@tribunemedia.net
FREE National Movement leader Michael Pintard has apologised to Bahamians who were hurt by decisions of the Minnis administration, saying: “We did not get everything right.”
His comment came as the FNM wrapped up its three-day convention at Atlantis on Friday night after Shanendon Cartwright and Dr Duane Sands were elected deputy leader and chairman of the party respectively and dozens of others were elected to various posts.
Mr Pintard struck notes of unity in his speech and criticised the Progressive Liberal Party for hypocrisy, failing to follow financial laws and victimisation.
“Some folks,” he said, “are feeling some type of way about us so as we celebrate all that we accomplished, and it has been much, under Prime Minister Ingraham it has been much, under Prime Minister Minnis it has been much, but let’s also acknowledge that we made some decisions that resonate in entirely the wrong way with many, many Bahamians.
“Some of you sitting in here were left vulnerable in the public service, had no idea that the PLP would behave in the manner they said they had abandoned. I want to say I regret that we made some of those decisions and you were hurt and we apologise to every Bahamian who has been hurt by any decision that we had made. I believe that the decisions came out of a place in our heart where often we thought the right decision was being made. But nevertheless the consequences are real for you.
“And so we don’t hold you responsible for us being in opposition. No, you made a decision that you felt was in your interest, whether it was to vote against us or to stay home from voting. Our job is to hear and feel the response of the Bahamian people and make a determination that we will make adjustments where adjustments are required. We did not get everything right and we should be honest and say it.”
Mr Pintard has been particularly focused on the firings and terminations of contracts under the PLP administration.
“Here is a government that has the notion that anyone who was hired in the last four and a half years must be FNM so it’s perfectly okay to fire them,” he said.
“We have some ministers (who) will come on television, they sound exceptionally smooth and eloquent, but at the end of the day the story they tell does not resemble the truth. In Urban Renewal it is a naked attempt to replace one group of Bahamians with another group of Bahamians.”
Mr Pintard also contrasted the FNM’s culture with the PLP’s culture.
“We are distinctly different from them. There is a culture that’s different and so it’s important for us not to demonise our brothers and sisters from the Progressive Liberal Party. They are good people just like us. But there is a culture of entitlement, there’s a culture where some of you have told us heart wrenching stories of sitting at your desk and a minister of state can attack you while you at your desk with a verbal barrage that I cannot repeat here or in private. We are different because I can’t think of an administration, past or the most recent one, that would tolerate a Member of the Parliament behaving in that way.”
As for his own future, Mr Pintard said he will serve the party only for as long as members want him to do so.
“I will serve at your pleasure for as long as you would have me and rest assured, the day you make the determination you don’t want me I wouldn’t be fighting tooth and nail, left right and centre, east, west, north and south to hold on,” he said.
Comments
yari 2 years, 1 month ago
Three snakes, all out for themselves. Time for a new party.
JackArawak 2 years, 1 month ago
Fifty years of failure sir. Try actual efficiency, honesty and transparency. Something we haven’t seen in a “coons age”
IslandWarrior 2 years, 1 month ago
Damage done, lessons learnt. Bahamians need better, and we demand better. Bahamians will not be bamboozled by proven failed politicians who, when in need, look for the understanding of supporters; those days are finished.
The level of hurt and disappointment in the entire Minnis Administration is irreconcilable. There are no reprieves, no reset buttons. As long as the FNM continue to push its failures under the fool's carpet, it will remain in the dark wilderness of political failures.
The names of Wells, Campbell, Bethel, Turnquest, Minnis, Pintard will forever be edged in stone, as the people who let down the Bahamian People.
Delivering them into the hands of the PLP, returning the country to an ideology of victimisation, partisanship, and evil corrupt practises that many were confident we would not see returned to the lives of Bahamians for a very long time.
The wilderness is dark, my friends, very dark.
moncurcool 2 years, 1 month ago
Sadly you are mistaken. 5 years ago the peope voted out the PLP. 5 years later wiith no apologies ever offered they voted back in the same people they voted out.
Munroe told them to kiss his a** 5 years ago. never apologized and the people 5 years later voted him in along with the same old tired Mitchell, Davis, Sears, Martin, Darville.
Sorry but Bahamians stay getting bamboozled by politicians.
At least Pintard is the first leader I have ever heard apologize.
IslandWarrior 2 years, 1 month ago
I guess you are not so old to know any better; all politicians "apologise" it goes with the culture, and in the Bahamas taking the Bahamian People for a ride, and making empty promises for five years job of easy money and privilege some politicians will even eat their vomit. I was told that the job is so sweet, why not; I must feel good because a failed politician said sorry, and I paid him to serve, hell no, my disappointments are worth much more than a sorry.
licks2 2 years, 1 month ago
Yoon learn a damn thing!! The people went back to the PLP to get rid of yinna FNMs? Only one thing that is not mistakened! DON''T GET TOO COMFORTABLE IN OFFICE. . .ONE-DONE-AND-YA-GO!! Iffin yinna een gettin that lesson in yinna thick skulls. . .we ger have to keep teachin yinna that!!
Minnis government was a disaster. . .total waste of good time!! Yinna just had the wrong leader there fella. . .it is still left to see what the people dem think of Davis!!
Pintard een need to apologize ta we. . .WE DON'T CARE FOR THAT MATTER!! Yinna did what yinna had to do. . .WE DID WHAT WE HAD TA DO!!! Next in line please!! What the FNM do and say will not make a hill of beans to us now. . ."da one neem ova"!! Quite frankly, I een on Pintard run either!! Iffin he ger act retarded-like as leader. . .ween ger be on his run either!! One screw-up at a time. . .lets see iffin this one ger act like the last one. . .like heen gat no damn sense as leader!!
mandela 2 years, 1 month ago
Now is a good time for a strong third party to emerge. When it comes down to politics on a scale of 0ne to ten I will give the opposition leader a five and his deputy a three. The present government will have to mess up BIG TIME to let these juniors topple them. To lose to these juniors would be worst than losing to Minnis.
licks2 2 years, 1 month ago
Yoon reading what people dem say aye? The Bahamian people don't care who is young or old. . .dat ship done sail man!! If the PLP do nonsense, they will get their old azzez handed to them just as fast as the last crew got their tails placed on a plattter for they mar coffee tables!!
It een gat a damn thing to do with the opposition. . .ween on they run right now dude!! It is the PLP and WE right now fella!! They "check" fer we. . .we check fer them come next election!! Oppositions don't do crap to move governments out. . .them rascals "roll" theyself out when they do crap with the Bahamian people!! Let Davis don't take heed and do the right thing by the Bahamian people!! He might as well buy himself some wheels and "nail" them on the majority of them PLPs shoes them!! They will be rolled out. .. ALL ER THEM SO!!
tribanon 2 years, 1 month ago
Sadly, Pintard doesn't even realise his statement "We did not get everything right" is the understatement of the decade. Truth be told, the last administration led by the tyrannical and grossly incompetent Minnis got nothing right, absolutely nada!
Hopefully Pintard understands and appreciates that he is now leader of the opposition only because of the complete implosion of the FNM party and what it did to our country and its people. Pintard is where he is only because he happened to be the least worse of the worst that somehow managed to get re-elected.
And Duane Sands, who lacks common sense, has played an instrumental role along with the Red China controlled W.H.O. and P.A.H.O. in all of the most harmful pandemic foolishness that has gone on in our country since March of 2020.
With the politically tone deaf Sands as its chairman, the FNM party stands no chance of ever being resurrected from the tomb in which it now rightfully resides, thanks in great part to the most horrific and incompetent PM the Bahamas could ever possibly have - MINNIS!
Only megalomaniac Minnis could make a corrupt scoundrel like Davis seem like a choir boy. Bahamian voters are sorely lacking the loud voice they should have in freeing themselves of the corrupt and abusive ruling class of PLP and FNM politicians. Those two political parties and the ruling group of politicians behind each of them should have long ago been removed from our country's political landscape. And any Bahamian voter who believes otherwise fully deserves the worst of the hardships that lie ahead for our country.
TalRussell 2 years, 1 month ago
The Revolution with Comrade Mr. Carmichael, emself like Pinard/Minnis, still hasn't gotten de backstory's concept, why 4 out 10 redshirts, were sooo unmoved to show up on election day? Apparently, Comrade Mr. Carmichael, never noticed, how de very same remained still unmoved 4 out 10 reds, couldn't be bothered with attending Pinard/Minnis's, poorly attended red party's still mixed up about speaking truths' staged like de fake OBAN documents concept of a convention, ― Yes?
tribanon 2 years, 1 month ago
It's truly hard for me to tell who among us frequently posting to this website is more warped and bent in their unwavering gibberish support for the PLP no matter what ........ but hands down, it has got to be either you or Birdie.
TalRussell 2 years, 1 month ago
@ComradeTribanon, you're equally intelligent to De Guardian's De Revolution with Host Mr. Carmichael, Proverb wise:
"If Team Pintard/Minnis, along with 37 red shirt members of de House of Assembly, could've bothered shi% to take de time, over 1,590 days, to do governance right and speak truth, shouldn't it be a must asks, why should de same popoulaces who scorned and shunned de red party, are now to believe de convention reds are now speaking truth, if only. they're given another mandate, this time extended out to 1591 days, to have de time to do it over and right,** ― Yes?
JokeyJack 2 years, 1 month ago
Apology - ok - cool - but does this mean that you are no longer gonna "run ya 'mout" about stupid Covid rules? Are you going to fight to allow the children of the Bahamas to be able to breathe in school? To be able to breathe at all? Travon Martin? You have your foot on their necks?
moncurcool 2 years, 1 month ago
How can you compare mask mandates with what happened to Travon Martin? Seriously?
I guess it is just a jokey and I am missing it.
tribanon 2 years, 1 month ago
Are you kidding?!!! What the political ruling class has done to our children in the name of COVID is infinitely worse than whatever that racist idiot did to Travon. Grow up.
carltonr61 2 years, 1 month ago
He apologized for the mistakes made by the FNM but he has not listed them. That was an empty arrogant apology. At least be like Brave and say what the party did wrong.
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