The Tribune

SINCE the departure of Lanisha Rolle from the post of Minister of Youth, Sports and Culture, there has been a lot of talk about women in politics.

As our columnist Alicia Wallace argues in her column today, the problem isn’t the departure of Mrs Rolle – but the absence of women on the political scene altogether.

Looking across the political divide from the FNM, which looks like it might not be giving Mrs Rolle a renomination for the election either, we see there are just as few women, more or less, in the ranks of the PLP.

One of those who might have been given a nomination was Monique Pindling, the daughter of former Prime Minister Sir Lynden Pindling.

She had hoped to run in the constituency long held by her father, but was told last summer she would not get the nomination.

Ms Pindling had also caught the eye at the PLP convention, when she lambasted the PLP and it had “become weak” and “dishonest” and allowed the political ambitions of a “few men to dash the aspirations of a whole people”. That she talked of men seems all the more pointed now.

Fast forward to today, in the wake of Picewell Forbes stepping aside from the race to win that Central and South Andros seat Ms Pindling had hoped for, and it appears there is still no prospect of her securing that post. Instead, it looks likely the nomination will go to Leon Lundy – who among other things is the godchild of PLP leader Philip “Brave” Davis.

Indeed, Ms Pindling seems to fear her father’s name counts against her now. She said party leadership “alluded to something about negativity of my dad and didn’t want it to be the focus and things like that”.

Goodness knows her father has featured many times in this column – and the legacy he left for this country was one that led us to a path of higher crime and an international reputation as a nation for sale. He was surrounded by corruption claims, leading to an official commission finding evidence of corruption in his Cabinet and the police.

Ms Pindling, however, is not her father. Her legacy is just starting, and she should be judged on her own merits, not for her surname.

Turn to Alicia Wallace’s column and you’ll see she points out the number of women securing nominations is falling far short of even 30 percent. Less than a third. As it stands, there are just five women in Parliament – 12.8 percent of the total. That’s less than one in seven.

Blocking the path of candidates such as Ms Pindling because of those who went before her isn’t any way to increase the number of women in Parliament.

There is, again, one woman in Cabinet. Lanisha Rolle’s position may have been filled by Iram Lewis, but Pakesia Parker-Edgecombe has moved to fill Mr Lewis’ former position as Minister of State for Disaster Preparedness, Management and Reconstruction.

One is not enough – and both parties should be doing more to give women a chance at candidacy. Judging them for what they offer – not for what others have done before them – would be a start.

Electric costs

Grand Bahama Power Company isn’t looking to win any friends.

The company’s delayed plan to introduce a charge on customers to recover the costs it ran up in Hurricane Dorian has come into effect – from January this year.

No formal warning was made of the new charge it seems – which seems grossly unfair. You can’t just charge customers more without telling them, that’s completely inappropriate.

If we cast our gaze further afield, power companies in Texas recently ran into a public relations disaster when it started charging customers many thousands of dollars more without warning after its own supply chain had problems because of the winter storm. People weren’t told they had to pay more until they saw it in their bills, it seems – and that caused enough of a backlash to lead to widespread resignations from board executives.

The scale of the charge in Grand Bahama is not as high – but the principle is the same. You have to tell people what they can expect to pay.

As Pastor Eddie Victor says, unemployment in Grand Bahama could well be around 50 percent right now. He said: “Can you now imagine trying to extract more revenue from a destitute population? It doesn’t make any sense.”

The rebuilding job needed after Hurricane Dorian was extensive – no one is arguing that. But the manner in which Grand Bahama Power Company is going about paying for it is alienating customers rather than making everyone feel as if they’re all in it together.

In September, this column argued that it was time for a rethink by the company. If there was a rethink, this wasn’t the best idea.