The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

A leading Bahamian aviation operator yesterday urged the government to “strike a balance” between demanding health travel visas from Bahamians while exempting foreigners from this requirement.

Anthony K Hamilton, Southern Air’s director of administration, and president of the Bahamas Association of Air Transport Operators, told Tribune Business that Bahamian travellers are just as important as their foreign counterparts after it was revealed that the government is waiving health visa requirements for cruise passengers on vessels sailing out of Florida.

The requirement, though, remains in place for Bahamians, and Mr Hamilton said: “All of this goes together with putting a proper plan in place for the airline industry and working through it in that light.

“Now in this instance, I suspect what they’re trying to do is maximise the economic benefit, but then you need a balance of this in terms of the privilege afforded the foreign party as it was the domestic party. Movement on behalf of the Bahamian populace is equally important to the economy as it is for the foreign parties.”

Dionisio D’Aguilar, minister of tourism and aviation, speaking at the weekend, said: “With cruises that initiate out of Florida, the government has loosened its restrictions somewhat by saying all of those passengers that embark in Florida will not require a health visa on the condition that the cruise company guarantees that if any of the cruise passengers get symptoms or feel unwell, they are disembarked.”

Mr Hamilton, though, added: “We need to strike a balance. One of the things they often say in connection with this is the fact that they have information we don’t necessarily have.

“But again, there’s a responsibility to the citizenry at large, in the best interest of the country. So the other aspect of that would be communication and ensuring adequate communication takes place, ensuring that the public is in a position to understand why that decision was taken.”

Frederick Mitchell, chairman of the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP), blasted the exemption for non-home porting cruise passengers as “discriminatory”. He added of the health travel visa: “The PLP will scrap it altogether and make sure that people who enter the country are COVID-19 free or fully vaccinated. This visa thing is a bureaucratic nightmare.”

He described the cruise passenger exemption as a clear “double standard”, as “the people in Bimini complain, for example, that while the police are harassing them about curfew infractions, tourists ride up and down Bimini flagrantly ignoring the rules without hindrance”.