The Tribune

LAST week, the Gaming Board announced that any objections to the applications submitted to it by the nine web shop companies for gaming licences must be in before 5pm on April 10 — that was Friday, just two days ago.

This notice did not give anyone, who might have been interested in expressing an opinion, time to do so as applicants’ notices were only published on Wednesday. From learning who the applicants were on Wednesday morning to 5pm Friday hardly gave Bahamians time to think, let alone commit their thoughts to paper and get those thoughts to the Gaming Board by 5pm.

Obviously, the Gaming Board was just going through a formality, it was not interested in the public’s opinion — official minds had been made up as became obvious when Sebas Bastian jumped the gun last week —April Fool’s Day in fact – and announced the opening of his newest web shop even though government had not granted him a licence. He called it taking a gamble — it was a big gamble; a costly gamble if it fails, but being a sensible man he must have had some private assurances.

However, if the public’s overwhelming “No” to gambling in a referendum on January 28, 2013 could be brushed aside and web shops legalised at a cost to the Public Treasury of between $1m and $5m — an official accounting for the referendum is yet to be announced — what does it matter what opinion the public has on any issue that might affect it and future generations? Obviously, we are all faceless appendages out there for government to ignore — until, of course, election day is announced.

Although the Gaming Board invited opinions, it wanted no opinions that might overtax their consciences. The Board’s announcement made it clear that it would “not entertain objections which are solely based on moral opposition to gaming”.

In other words, the Board did not want to hear the mumbo-jumbo uttered by Rev Philip Blackburn, Methodist minister and chairman of the Bahamas Christian Council, who on behalf of the Council concluded on August 6, 1965: “Gambling is a social disease. It feeds on ignorance. It is a danger to the poor who cannot afford it and to the wealthy because it encourages self-interest rather than community services.”

And a letter from Alvernon Dorsett on July 22, 1965, which expressed the feelings of the majority of Bahamians at that time: “We have come a far way in these islands. I cannot see why there is need to resort to gambling for further advancement.”

In the July 10, 1967, general elections the PLP and UBP tied at the polls with 18 votes. This necessitated much horse-trading behind the scenes with the late Sir Alvin Braynen and Sir Randol Fawkes enabling the PLP to govern with a majority of one. The death of PLP parliamentarian Uriah McPhee early the following year — a death that was kept secret for several days before it was announced — forced another election, which the PLP won by almost wiping out the opposition. The PLP took 29 of the 38 seats.

The PLP’s main plank in those elections was that if the UBP won the government, casino gambling would be assured, and it would spread throughout the islands. The PLP vowed to wipe it out. In 1967, one month into the first majority government, then deputy prime minister Arthur Hanna — before the 1968 election which gave the PLP an overwhelming majority – vowed that the PLP would abolish casino gambling. He said that his government did not intend to expropriate the existing casino properties, but planned to close them down after the expiration of their ten-year Certificate of Exemption. The exemption had about six more years to run. Although Sir Lynden denied that his government would abolish gambling in the Bahamas, he vowed that he would make certain it did not spread to the Family Islands.

On January 16, 1968, Prime Minister Pindling released a statement that his government had come to the conclusion that “for the sake of the reputation and future progress and development of the Bahama Islands and the Bahamian people it is essential that the Bahamas should not be looked upon as a gambling resort”.

By February 5, 1969 a suggestion in the House of Assembly by Opposition member, the late Norman Solomon, urging legislators to ban Bahamians from gambling at the Hobby Horse Hall race-track brought screams of “No” from PLP supporters in the gallery.

“I am told,” said Mr Solomon, “that the people who really cannot afford to lose, lose persistently at Hobby Horse Hall – I would not doubt that its existence may even contribute to the crime rate to this country.” Already crime had started to become an issue, which took root in the next few months with the transportation of illegal drugs. This was when the crime with which we are dealing today took root and grew.

Urging government — as it had done with the casinos — to consider retaining Hobby Horse Hall only as a sport for tourists, Mr Solomon said: “I have been told on many occasions that people go as far as to mortgage their homes to bet ready cash.”

We recall the late Nurse Alice Hill Jones, who headed government’s pre and post-natal clinics, making many visits to The Tribune to urge us to support closing the betting booths at Hobby Horse Hall to Bahamians. She said that during racing season, all babies brought to the government clinics had lost weight because their father’s race track betting denied them their much needed nourishment — “taking milk out of the babies mouths to bet on the horses,” she used to complain. Race season took a terrible toll on the health of children. In those years, it was the number one social issue.

Mr Solomon said he thought the casino gambling ban, should not only be continued for the protection of Bahamians, but should be extended to the race track. Sir Lynden, a strong proponent of Bahamians being banned from the casinos, explained that the casino ban should not be regarded as discriminatory, but rather as protective of Bahamians. However, he would not go as far as banning Bahamians betting at the track, maintaining that this was not a year-round activity.

Hobby Horse Hall, he said, as he played to his supporters in the gallery, was “a more limited operation” and took place between January and Easter on only two days of the week. He probably thought that babies denied nourishment by their gambling fathers would not die of hunger in that short space of time.

On the other hand, he said, casinos were operated from 18 to 24 hours daily. He was particularly concerned with the implication of the extension of gambling to Bahamian residents, especially “government employees and others”.

Today the PLP has come full circle. Although casino gambling has been limited and Bahamians by law have been protected from their human weaknesses by being banned from playing the tables, the once illegal “numbers racket” – now known as web shops – is legal by government decree — in referendum it was defeated by the people. If applications of the nine web shop owners are approved, not only will gambling be year round, but it will saturate New Providence. It also will be heavily represented throughout the family islands.

Although Sir Lynden never wanted the Bahamas to be “looked upon as a gambling resort”, the decision of his own party 45 years later has made that inevitable. And, unlike the seasonal horse racing with its social fall-out, the web shops will be open daily year round. Today this government cannot cope with unemployment and the resultant crime. However, we hope it will have solutions for the inevitable social disruptions that will follow in the wake of web shop gambling throughout the islands – the curse that Rev Blackburn called a “social disease”.

It was truly said that “where there is no vision the people perish…”