By OSWALD T. BROWN
WASHINGTON, D.C., July 12, 2021 – Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) Leader Philip “Brave” Davis posted something on his Facebook page recently that arrested my attention in a profound way and, consequently, was the inspiration for this very personal commentary.
Commenting on the accomplishments of three Bahamians that generated widespread press coverage in the United States, Mr. Davis wrote in the narrative that accompanied a collage of photos: “Jazz Chisolm hit his 10th home run, Deandre Ayton posted another double-double, and 12-year old Roy Seligman made history as the first Bahamian to compete in the finals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee. A week of Bahamian excellence on display! What a great lead-in to our Independence celebration. There’s nothing we can’t do and nowhere we can’t compete.”
Initially, I did not make the connection that I played an important role in the development of all three of those areas in The Bahamas, having served as President of the Bahamas Baseball Association (BBA) as well as President of the Bahamas Amateur Basketball Association (BABA) and, of course, introducing the Scripps National Spelling Bee to The Bahamas when I was editor of the Nassau Guardian in 1998.
As President of the BBA for five years in the 1960s and again for two years in the early 1970s after I returned from London following a one-year journalism training course on the staff of the London Evening Standard, I took teams to compete in the prestigious National Baseball Congress (NBC) tournament in Wichita, Kansas, which has over the years been the “stepping stone” for persons aspiring to make it to the Major Leagues.
What’s more, prior to becoming President of the BBA, I was President of the Bahamas Amateur Basketball Association (BABA), and took several teams to compete against top high school teams in Miami, Florida, having instituted a sports-improvement policy that the road to improvement for local sports talent was to compete against more talented players.
The idea of introducing the Scripps National Spelling Bee to The Bahamas was actually planted in my mind when I was news editor of The Washington Informer, an award-winning Black-owned newspaper in Washington, D.C., for more than 12 years when I previously lived in D.C. for 21 years before returning to The Bahamas permanently in 1996. The Informer is the sponsor of the city-wide Spelling Bee in the District of Columbia and the Prince George’s County, Maryland, Spelling Bee.
Introducing the Scripps Spelling Bee to The Bahamas is at the pinnacle of the list of accomplishments in my live of which I am extremely proud, and the outstanding performance of 12-year-old Roy Seligman in the recent 2021 Scripps National Spelling Bee really inflated my heart with joy and pride.
I thought it was important to take this “walk down memory lane” before focusing on an issue that has disturbed me for a long time and has recently resurfaced as I continue my struggle to avoid eviction because of back rent that I owe. Over the years, it would seem as if many past accomplishments of some Bahamians, no matter how important they may have been to the national development of our country, are “buried in the dust” by politicians with a political agenda.
I still do no understand why the current Free National Movement government would single me out for victimization, given the accomplishments I previously mentioned and the fact that I was a front-line “soldier” in the struggle for majority rule and actually is a founding member of the FNM.
Unquestionably, I would not be in the dire financial situation I am in today if the FNM had implemented a proposal I presented to Prime Minister Dr. Hubert Minnis back in 2017 when I was in Nassau promoting my novel WOES OF LIFE to continue doing what I did at the Embassy of Th Bahamas for four-plus years on a contractual basis after my diplomatic appointment as Press, Cultural Affairs and Information Manager at the Embassy of The Bahamas was revoked. I subsequently reduced the financial remuneration I was requesting to $2,000 a month, and was later told by His Excellency Sidney Collie, Bahamas Ambassador to the United States and Permanent Representative to the Organization of American States, that it had been approved.
Initially, I was informed that former Deputy Prime Minister and Miniter of Finance Peter Turnquest was responsible for blocking the implementation of my proposal, but he vehemently denied doing so publicly in a post of Facebook. I am now being told that Prime Minister Minnis himself is the reason why my proposal has not been implemented.
Why Dr. Minnis has taken such vindictive position against me is a mystery, given that fact that one of his trusted political advises – his brother Cyril “Boxer” Minnis, who lives in Freeport – and I were both ardent supporters of the late Sir Cecil Wallace Whitfield, the founding leader of the FNM – and were in the political trenches together promoting the FNM in Grand Bahama.
Meanwhile, despite my past accomplishments politically and otherwise, Sebastian “Sebas” Bastian has made a great deal of money selling numbers and for having done so, he has been appointed non-resident Bahamas Ambassador to South Africa by Prime Minister Minnis, which should give the Bahamian electorate a good idea of what Dr. Minnis considers to be in the country’s best interest.
