The Tribune

By EARYEL BOWLEG

Tribune Staff Reporter

ebowleg@tribunemedia.net

PROTESTERS came out on Saturday at Blake Road to demonstrate against planned oil drilling in The Bahamas.

Cars lined up along the road draped with signs that read “Keep it blue,” “Oil kills marine life” and “Oil drilling is killing” in the socially distant protest.

Sam Duncombe, reEarth president, said the protesters were out on the street for about two hours. She estimated about 50 people, including several prominent activists, turned out over the course of the day. Some stayed the entire time while other people decided to pull over and join the protest. Some honked their horns in support as they drove past.

“We are expressing our disgust with the fact that the government promised us that there would be no offshore oil drilling one year and then decided to proceed with it even after they had promised us that it would not happen. So we’re very upset about that,” the reEarth president told The Tribune.

“We shouldn’t be doing anymore fossil fuel projects period... 85 percent of The Bahamas is five feet or less above sea level and you know when you burn fossil fuel you add to climate change and global warming and all of these issues.

“The prime minister went to the UN after Dorian and was begging for help,” she added. “We’re saying what The Bahamas needs to do is start practising some of the things that need to be done (to combat climate change), for example moving away from fossil fuel.

“You can’t be allowing projects that actually harm the environment in particular with regard to climate change and then go and ask for money to help us deal with climate change. You have to do your part and then maybe the UN will help us do some stuff too.”

Last week, several US congressmen and women urged the prime minister and the environment minister to reconsider the oil drilling agreement with Bahamas Petroleum Company (BPC). The letter noted the agreement was “directly contrary to the urgent call made at the United Nations just last year”.

“In that speech, prime minister, you cited the contribution carbon emissions have made to the climate crisis and the devastating impacts this crisis continues to have on island nations like the Bahamas, including those wrought by Hurricane Dorian, rising sea levels, and natural barrier degradation,“ the December 17 letter stated.

Ms Duncombe said she was very grateful that the US congress representatives have reached out to Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis explaining their position.

“You have to remember that those Congressmen were responsible for getting a no-drilling, no oil-exploration ban put in place in Florida’s water. So as foreign neighbours and as a community of countries, we have to work together to do things in tandem so that what I do doesn’t affect your country and what you do doesn’t affect my country.”

She also expressed disagreement with the prime minister’s explanation that his administration cannot get out of the oil exploration deal that was inked by the Christie administration.

Ms Duncombe argued that if the government’s legal team could not find a way out of the deal, the Minnis administration should have sought external legal help.

“When the prime minister talks about his legal team said no, that’s when you go to the country and you ask all the legal brains in the country help us get out of here instead of keeping it all in y’all little circle of people…... So this is a huge slap in the face and you know as a Bahamian citizen I am very insulted by this move,” Ms Duncombe said.