The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

As a shareholder in the Bank of The Bahamas, I guess I should be grateful that the Government has decided to rescue the Bank from the consequences of its risky loan policies. But the truth is that I am angry that my investment in a profitable banking institution was put in jeopardy by the Bank’s poor risk decisions and what must have been inadequate oversight by the Bank’s Board and the Central Bank.

I understand that the mess at the Bank was caused by as few as 13 substantial loans made to the businesses of politically favoured individuals. If true, that is outrageous.

The Government has created a new financial institution whose sole purpose is to collect as much of the bad debt as possible. The new bank will be headed by a PLP insider, James Smith, Minister of State for Finance in Mr Christie’s first administration and now a consultant to the Ministry of Finance. He will, no doubt, be handsomely paid for his trouble.

The accounting firm had been identified to work along with Mr Smith. That’s still more public money to be spent trying to collect bad loans.

It seems to me that if the list of the 13 or so delinquent commercial loans were made public, it would go a long way to explaining to shareholders whether the loans are evidence of the shortcomings of the bank’s management team or whether it was a case of the majority shareholder, that is the Government, dictating loan policy to the Bank.

How this mess was created has to be thoroughly investigated and as the saying goes, let the chips fall where they may. Someone must be held accountable for this fiasco.

MARGARET COOPER

Nassau,

December 14, 2014