The Tribune

By Dr Johnathan Rodgers

Rumor has it that when the infamous criminal Willie Sutton was asked: “Why do you rob banks?”, his response was: “Because that is where the money is”. When I was reviewing the list of entities that will be exempt from Value-Added Tax (VAT), and saw that the two largest and most profitable industries (banking and the web shops) in the Bahamas were going to be exempt, the Wille Sutton quote immediately sprung to mind.

However, I am not entirely surprised that both of these industries have been exempted, because not only are they the two largest and most profitable entities, but are also the two largest political lobbying groups in the Bahamas. The commercial banks have always had the Government in their back pocket, and now the numbers lords have them in their front pocket. Thus, when necessary, they can literally squeeze the Government financially from both sides into acting in a manner that is not always in the public interest. I will briefly outline some of these actions, why they have occurred and how the public should respond.

The Government held a referendum on gambling but chose to ignore the results of the referendum. The Government not only spent a large amount of taxpayer money on the referendum, but also on several studies and the services of various consultants to determine the possible structure of the web shop industry once legalised.

The Prime Minister has recently stated that there is yet another study being conducted, but that the public should not be too concerned with the cost of this study, because the numbers lords are helping to fund it. In other words, the Government of the Bahamas is willing to accept funds from an ‘illegal’ industry to fund a study pertaining to the legalisation of the industry itself. How can Government honestly expect the public to accept the creditability of such a study?

The commercial banks have all stated that even if the gaming industry is legalised, they will not accept deposits from the numbers houses because they risk losing access to their correspondent banks in the US. In other words, they would not be able to conduct any transactions in US dollars with these banks. Of course, what the banks are not saying is that they are more concerned by the fact that the numbers lords are now lending out more money than they are to Bahamian consumers. This is hurting their present and future bottom lines.

Th Attorney General, Allyson Maynard-Gibson, recently flew off to Paris to hold discussions with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and determine whether or not the commercial banks would be cut off from their corresponding banks if the Government regularises the numbers business. The public is still awaiting the outcome of these discussions.

The Government has spear headed, in fairly short order, new gaming legislation, yet we were recently told that it will take an additional two years before an amended Freedom of Information Act will be available. Wow, even Blind Blake can see through this one.

It seems to me that the Government has spent an inordinate amount of time, money (public funding) and effort, and lost a tremendous amount of integrity, in its attempt to regularise an illegal industry, when this country has a myriad of other far more pressing and important issues that need to be addressed.

Now that the Government has been forced to introduce VAT because of the total mismanagement of the Bahamian economy, both by itself and past governments, it is exempting the very industries who could, should and can afford to pay their fair share of taxes. No government in any developed country in the world would have even dreamt of or, indeed, been allowed to act in this manner.

The new VAT legislation gives the Government the right to fine and jail persons who are VAT non-compliant. Before any VAT delinquent is subjected to any of these penalties, all of the delinquent politicians who have failed to file their disclosures should be made to pay the associated outstanding fines and/or serve the jail time as outlined in the Disclosures Act.

No man or woman is above the law, and that includes those who we have elected to look after our best interests as opposed to only the interest of special interest groups. I would urge all Bahamians to stand up and refuse to accept and comply with VAT until the numbers industry and the banks become VAT-table and the politicians pay their dues. VAT a mess!