The Tribune

IT seems it was never likely that Lanisha Rolle would depart the political scene without having her say.

Mrs Rolle’s time in government has been turbulent, to say the least, with few speaking up in her favour from her time as either Minister of Social Services or subsequently Minister of Youth, Sports and Culture. She resigned from Cabinet in February.

Yesterday, she used her contribution in the Budget debate not to analyse the finances of the nation but to defend her conduct in office and to lament the FNM decision not to select her for the next election.

Mrs Rolle talked about a statement issued by the Cabinet Office at the time, which said that certain information had been brought to the attention of Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis.

She said: “In case anyone stands to assume that I was under some investigation and this is the reason for my not being nominated, I requested further clarification of the statement made by the Cabinet which incorrectly insinuated that my resignation was as the result of some investigation. The good member for Killarney (Dr Minnis) clarified in a public statement to the press that there was no investigation concerning this member. I thank him.”

Whatever you may think of Mrs Rolle, however, there absolutely should be some clarity given around the circumstances for her departure.

The Tribune understands that Dr Minnis ordered a lockdown of the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture after people affiliated with the National Sports Authority expressed concerns to him about operations at the NSA.

Dr Minnis did indeed say Mrs Rolle was not being directly investigated but when that lockdown combines with the departure of a Cabinet minister, of course questions have to be asked – yet answers seem to be slow in coming.

What happened as a result of that lockdown? We have heard nothing since. An internal audit was said to have been requested at the time – and it was unusual for the Cabinet statement to note those “certain matters”.

Will that audit be released? Will the public ever get to know what those matters were? It seems not in any hurry, just as a long-promised probe into the disintegration of the Bahamas Power & Light board has never seemed to surface.

In the meantime, Mrs Rolle used her Budget debate time to tackle issues probably not terribly close to the hearts of her constituents, such as an increase in salary for parliamentarians and a greater allocation for MPs.

We’re not sure there will be many tears for the departure from Parliament of Mrs Rolle, but there should at least be answers.

Remember, our Prime Minister campaigned for the job while talking about transparency. It’s long past time to show some.

Healthcare heroes

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, people around the world were urged to support our healthcare heroes.

These were the doctors, the nurses and the support staff keeping our hospitals going as wave after wave of the virus hit our shores.

We were urged to do our part under emergency measures to help keep healthcare staff safe and to help them in the fight.

Words can only go so far, however, and promises were made for an honorarium for those staff members who, let’s be honest, risked their own health and their own lives to care for others. Indeed, four healthcare workers have been identified as having died from COVID in the course of their duties, and their families will receive $100,000 each.

It is good that at last those promises are coming close to being fulfilled. It is sad, however, that it has taken so long.

The promise, nurses say, goes back a year to mid-2020. Health Minister Renward Wells has now said that nurses who worked directly with COVID patients can expect “something” in their bank accounts perhaps by the end of this month.

That still falls a little short. That “something” should be a definite number, and the date of payment should be in concrete. Apparently a decision is being made this week on when the payments will be made. We suggest that decision should have been made a long time ago.

We hope too that there will be no wrangling over who gets the payments, and this does not become a debate over who spent enough time with patients to qualify.

Our healthcare workers have indeed been heroes in this fight. They deserve to be treated as such.