Cynthia 'Mother' Pratt
By RASHAD ROLLE
Tribune Staff Reporter
rrolle@tribunemedia.net
FORMER Deputy Prime Minister and co-chair of Urban Renewal 2.0, Cynthia “Mother” Pratt, is calling for Bahamians to “stop politicising crime”.
Her comments come after the recent surge in violent killings left many blaming the PLP government who, during its 2012 political campaign, ran on a promise to reduce crime - including putting up signs highlighting the number of murders under the FNM.
Speaking to The Tribune yesterday, Mother Pratt, who served as National Security Minister between 2002 and 2007, said: “Crime has reached all of our doors, but I said in Parliament many times as Minister of National Security when politics was being made out of crime that we are not to politicise crimes because crime knows no agenda; it doesn’t care about being bi-partisan; it has no respect for no one party.
“Today people are bickering about who is politicising crime but it started with me when the FNM said crime is my problem, saying I was doing nothing, that I was soft like some little preacher sitting down somewhere preaching.”
The FNM, she added, “are the ones who were politicising crime under my watch. It should not have been politicised from the beginning. I was in the chair when I was being attacked left, right and centre, and I’m sure the Bahamian people would remember quite well yet the number of murders under my watch was nothing to compare to other Ministers.”
Defending Urban Renewal 2.0 which she said has been unfairly criticised by some, Mother Pratt said: “Even while I stood in the halls of Parliament as PLP I never saw things through the political glass. I don’t play politics well. If I don’t believe in something, I won’t be a part of it. Urban Renewal has been a Godsend for the people, the poor people in particular. Many of those people in the inner and outer cities or suburbs are hurting badly because they are unemployed. Urban Renewal has helped them.”
She added: “The house is as strong as its foundation. While we pointing fingers at everybody and everybody pointing fingers at one another, we must realise there is a country sitting there being attacked in the international world. We all have to come together to do our part. We have to begin with the family structure; that’s why urban renewal is so important; we have to begin with the foundation. Crime was here from the foundation of the world according to the scripture. It will be here till the end of the world; it is up to us to minimize that. When we have no tolerance for it you will find that it will be minimised.”
Comments
bookiedread 10 years, 4 months ago
Lest we all forget, that these people put up billboards all over this country. Not she has the nerve to say we must stop politicising crime. I say Hogwash. This is just a classic case of the chickens coming home to roost. Bahamians voted for the government because they said they had a solution for crime, but alas it seems that they are clueless.
B_I_D___ 10 years, 4 months ago
She's saying not to politicize it, and yet throughout that entire interview, it was all about the FNM said this and the FNM criticized that...and as bookiedread states above...the PLP were the ones that took it to the next level and starting putting up billboards everywhere blaming the FNM for crime and to vote PLP. They are so full of the crap they speak they can't even hear the words coming out of their mouths.
proudloudandfnm 10 years, 4 months ago
Pretty political statement there Mother Pratt.....
hj 10 years, 4 months ago
Just wondering where she was when her colleagues were putting the billboards,and why she did not say anything at that time.
concernedcitizen 10 years, 4 months ago
ANOTHER one that goes for all that fire and brimstone ,sodom and gommora nonsense while having a fondness for the fairer sex ,,i,m not anti gay ,but i am anti hypocrite
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 4 months ago
UR 2.0 = "SOCIAL SERVICES duplication of effort and wasted money"
242star 10 years, 4 months ago
I swear our politicians don't think before they speak, or even listen to themselves...her statement itself politicizes crime. Come on man, these leaders killing me with their nonsense.
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 4 months ago
If I sell my house, my car, all of my clothes and give every bit of the proceeds to the Salvation Army, am I a good person? Have I shown how much I care for the poor? I would say yes I have, but how responsible have I been?
What Mother Pratt and the UR do-gooders fail to realize is that the Social Services framework has been set up specifically to handle the problems that UR is reinventing the wheel to handle. Further Social Services has persons trained in analyzing needs of families and individuals.
What the UR programme has basically done is replicate what Social Services already has in place and duplicated the administration of the services. More typists to do the same thing, more janitors to clean another rented office, more garbage bags for office desks, more lights for the two Department heads duplicating the same oversight function, more electricity ...and on and on. When if someone had thought it out, Social Services could have been given a bigger budget, run the entire operation more efficiently and still come in at a lower cost.
Also Urban Renewal in its real interpretation, is not a lawn care programme. It's about bringing jobs back into the neighborhoods, for example turning a rundown community into a fancy gated community, that is urban renewal, it resembles nothing that Mother Pratt is attempting to do.
concernedcitizen 10 years, 4 months ago
Urban renewel is jobs ,money, for votes ,,nothing more ,nothing less ..The old theory as w/ welfare in the US ,pump some money into the have nots and perhaps they,ll rob the haves less ,,only thing we now produce under educated youngsters faster then government can afford to employ them on "make believe jobs "'
sheeprunner12 10 years, 4 months ago
Mother Pratt who is politicizing crime???????
What the PLP is doing to Long Island is worse than politicizing crime.
No international airport ...................... why?
No Clarence Town mailboat ................... why?
No direct foreign investment opportunities ....................... why?
No modern government infrastructural facilities ......................why?
No agricultural or fisheries support ................................ why?
No land reform ................................why?
Mother Pratt please examine your own party first .......... modern day apartheid
SP 10 years, 4 months ago
The PLP and FNM are totally responsible for leading the country to where we are today.
That includes the good and the bad.
This Pratt PLP clown is trying to distance 40 years of political stupidity from the level of crime in society....And she probably really believe the majority of us are damn stupid enough to listen to that non-sense!
Failure of successive governments in education, immigration and development are the root causes of crime.....This is undeniable.
SHUT UP PRATT!
TalRussell 10 years, 4 months ago
Comrades how in the hell can you say you will shutdown crime, yet not a single numbers rackets "bosses" gambling joint has been closed, much less arrested and charged. There can't possibly be too many Bahamalanders left who don't clearly believe that, if only the politicians, talk show hosts, preacherman's, community organizers and the mainstream print media would get the hell out of the way, maybe we can begin to retake the streets of our tiny Nassau Town. Naturally there are some who will always allow politics to shutdown the truth.
Louis Armstrong - Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen (1962)
...// http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVKKRz...">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVKKRz...
banker 10 years, 4 months ago
Did Craig Flowers pay a $1,000 dollar fine in 2012? That mussee hurt him real bad!
TheObjectiveVoice 10 years, 4 months ago
Somehow, somewhere in the spirit, I see Branville McCartney sitting down in his Lazy Boy watching the PLP and the FNM beat each other up publicly, rather than working together to make things better. He's just sitting and watching and waiting for 2017 while they call each other dumb, stupid, irresponsible, pointing fingers, casting blame and he's really going to look like the only option for the way forward. He will remain blameless. A word to the wise is sufficient. He's a smart guy.
paul_vincent_zecchino 10 years, 4 months ago
Indeed, a smart man. And a good one.
TalRussell 10 years, 4 months ago
Comrade Leader Bran had his one night "Thrilla in Cable Beach" his little the green arm launch but even before the 2012 General Election dust had settled the Lazy Boy Leader has been much too damn comfy in he big chair, awaiting that special telephone call from the red shirts money-backers
sheeprunner12 10 years, 4 months ago
IN RESPONSE TO RORY
Long Island's legacy as a community of hardworking, independent and patriotic citizens cannot be questioned.
Long Island is synonymous with EXCELLENCE.
We have been shaped in the post-1967 era by artificial constituency boundaries and vicious political victimization under the PLP. Most of what has been achieved in (south) Long Island in the past 50 years is a testament to the work of the Long Island Association, Long Island residents and the FNM 1992-2002 regime.
Just take a drive from Seymour's to Gordon's and compare the two ends after you past Salt Pond.
RORY, do a little bit of research and stop engaging in cheap political chit chat
PS Rory, please identify if you have any LI roots.
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