The Tribune

FORMER Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis was in a talkative mood yesterday.

He spoke to reporters on a number of subjects – some of which were enough to raise an eyebrow.

Dr Minnis declared his support of the criminalisation of marital rape, for example, despite not having done so while he was in office.

He then set about taking his successor Philip “Brave” Davis to task – first for not defending the judiciary in the face of criticism from St Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves, who questioned why The Bahamas was granting bail to people charged with murder.

Readers who recall yesterday’s column will remember that Mr Davis spoke about the need for legal reforms – something we agree with – so this seems like Dr Minnis stirring up issues of territorial sovereignty rather than taking on the actual problems we face. Mr Gonsalves is only saying the same things that senior politicians and police officers have said here at home – it would seem churlish to take him to task for agreeing with Bahamian leaders.

More bizarrely, Dr Minnis also decided to criticise Mr Davis for the steps he has taken to try to stem the flow of guns into the country.

Dr Minnis said his successor is putting the United States at the centre of the country’s crime problems rather than focusing on local ways to stop the violence on our streets.

He said: “After promising on the campaign trail to address the crime problem, the Prime Minister now knows he has no clue as to what to do.

“His new strategy is to shift everyone’s focus to the role of people in the United States in the trafficking of guns to The Bahamas and the wider Caribbean.

“Guns trafficking plays a part in our crime problem, but there are much bigger problems the prime minister is not tackling.”

It is strange that Dr Minnis would at once acknowledge that gun trafficking plays a part in our situation and at the same time criticise Mr Davis for trying to do something about it.

Is gun trafficking the entirety of our problem? No, and no one is pretending that it is – but if we can reduce the number of illegal guns in our country, we can reduce the opportunity for such weapons to be used in ending someone’s life.

There are other issues of course – gangs, drugs, poverty, lack of opportunity, education problems, backlogs in the courts, a shortage of resources in fighting crime and in dealing with cases, and more besides.

But Dr Minnis was keen enough on dealing with the issue of guns for his government to champion ShotSpotter technology – to detect the sound of gunshots and allow police to respond faster to crime scenes. So he knows that guns play a major part in the violence our nation faces – and he already knew that too from the way in which our hospitals are sometimes overwhelmed with victims of gun crimes needing treatment to save their lives.

Dr Minnis talked of how the United States, from which most of the guns originate that arrive on our shores, is our closest friend – but it does not cost our friendship to call for gun manufacturers and sellers to be more responsible and for closing loopholes that make it easier for guns to be bought in a fashion that makes it easier to move them out of that country … and into ours. It is not the US government being taken to task, but rather particular US businesses.

If we cannot as a nation seek to hold individual businesses to account then what should we do in cases such as the FTX collapse – roll over and allow foreign companies to do what they please?

We are not sure what Dr Minnis is trying to achieve by opposing Mr Davis’ moves to limit gun supply lines – but he is right in one thing. He asks what are the Prime Minister’s plans to address problems in the justice system – and on that, we would all like to hear.

Tackling gun smuggling is one part of the big picture – but we have to play our own part too, and fix the delays in our legal system that leave cases idling for too long, and plays a part in the release on bail of violent offenders.