The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

A prominent businessman says there is no point in dwelling on the Progressive Liberal Party’s (PLP) crushing defeat at the polls last week, as the “verdict is clear” and “it’s time to move on”.

Sir Franklyn Wilson, the Sunshine Holdings and Arawak Homes chairman, told Tribune Business that the incoming Dr Hubert Minnis-led administration would hopefully be able to execute its plans, which would “see progress for us all”.

Sir Franklin, who has previously been critical of some of Dr Minnis’s policy pronouncements, told Tribune Business: “My thing is that it is appropriate to wish the new government God’s grace and every opportunity to help build the country and move it forward.”

Referring to the Free National Movement’s (FNM) landslide victory at the polls last week, which saw nearly all of the PLP’s Cabinet ministers and senior MPs lose their parliamentary seats, Sir Franklyn said: “The people have spoken and there is no point in getting into analysis. The verdict is clear and now it’s time to move on. The governing party issued a manifesto and the people know what they can expect.”

He added: “Obviously they thought that it was sufficient that, if implemented, it could bring about progress. Let’s wish and pray that they can execute their plans as they foreshadowed, and that the proper execution would see progress for us all.”

Sir Franklyn had warned that Dr Minnis’s plans to offer wide-ranging tax breaks “will lead the Bahamas into bankruptcy” if ever enacted, suggesting that his strategy for reducing the cost of living and reviving inner-city areas, which would become tax free zones, coupled with the provision of free tertiary education, would expand the fiscal deficit and undermine consolidation plans.