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A L L T H E N E W S Y O U N E E D T O R E A D I N T H E M O R N I N G

VOL. 31 - NO. 105 75 CENTSWEDNESDAY - JUNE 26TH, 2019

Dames BiDs Farewell to ms. Jamie martin, Director,

int’l narcotics anD law enForcement aFFairs

4 Minister Dames (3-L) presenting outgoing Director Jamie Martin (4-R) with a plaque and gift along with (L-R) CommissionerMurphy BDOCS, Commodore Bethel (RBDF), US Charge d'Affaires Stephanie Bowers, Commissioner Ferguson, PS Poitier

(SEE page 12 )

WE’RE IN CRISISBPL Union President Callsfor $100 million Injection

4 BPL Union President, Paul Maynard

he vexing load-shedding issue atBahamas Powerand Light is a

‘crisis,’ according toBahamas ElectricalWorkers Union PresidentPaul Maynard, who isnow calling on the gov-ernment to invest $100million to assist with theeffective operation of thepower plant. “What needs to happen

is the CEO needs to rec-ognize that this is a crisisthat we’re in, accept it,stop running away fromit,” Maynard said duringan interview with TheBahama Journal yester-day, adding that as aresult of the load-shed-ding crisis, BPL employ-ees are “over-taxed to themax” and there is a staffshortage.“This is no fun for us to

be doing,” Maynard said.

BY DEANDRE WILLIAMSONJournal Staff Writer

T

g See page 3...

16 Injured in Tour Bus CrashD’Aguilar Confident CrashWon’t Affect Tourism

Two Bahamians wereamong the 16 injured inthe Eleutheran Adventuretour bus accident onMonday in Rock Sound,Eleuthera. Minister of Health Dr.

Duane Sands confirmedoutside Cabinet onTuesday morning that thetwo Bahamians are in sta-ble condition at the

BY BERTHONY MCDERMOTTJournal Staff Writer

g See page 3...4 Minister of Tourism,Dionisio D’Aguilar

‘Threats to Lock OutMorton Salt EmployeesFrustrating,’ Says BrownMeeting with Labour Minister Next Week

The threat to lock MortonSalt employees out of theInagua Salt Plant hasonly further infuriatedthe Bahamas IndustrialManufacturers and Allied

Workers Union, whosePresident Jennifer Browncondemned such a moveas doing neither partyany good, but rather onlyfrustrates the process andworkers.Morton executives

BY BERTHONY MCDERMOTTJournal Staff Writer

g See page 4...

Charges Dropped for 80-Year-Old LawyerAccused of Stealing

An 80-year-old lawyerwas called upon toanswer charges of fraud-ulent breach of trust andstealing by reason ofservice, a matter stem-ming back almost 10years. Miriam Curling, of 24

East Bay Street, appearedin Magistrate’s Courtyesterday beforeMagistrate SamuelMcKinney. Mrs. Curling was

charged with stealing$85,000 cash which wasentrusted to her byRebecca Knowles in2010.

BY LICEC BASTIANJournal Staff Writer

g See page 4...

Progress BeingMade in Resolutionof Trade Disputes

Debate on the 2019/2020budget continued in theUpper Chamber withSenator Dion Foulkesgiving an account of theMinistry of Labour’s suc-cesses and challengesover the past 12 monthsand its concentrationmoving ahead.

That includes tradedisputes filed, in 2018,that figure stood at 924.“Four hundred and

sixty-five were resolvedwhile 305 pending, 37were withdrawn and 107were referred to theIndustrial Tribunal fortheir deliberations.” “In the Family Islands

in 2018, 283 disputes

BY BERTHONY MCDERMOTTJournal Staff Writer

g See page 4...

A2 NationalNEWSThe Bahama Journal

Wednesday - June 26th, 2019

97 Haitians Chargedwith Illegal Landing

Ninety-seven Haitiannationals appeared in theMagistrate’s Court inInagua beforeMagistrate KaraTu r n q u e s t - D e v e a u xwhere they were chargedwith illegal landing and

given an order of earlydeportation. According to the

Department ofImmigration, the groupcharged included 86adult males and 11 adultfemales. They were

turned over toImmigration officialsand are scheduled todepart from MatthewTown, Inagua for Port-au-Prince, Haiti on June26, 2019 at 9:00 a.m. Immigration officials

said group of Haitianmigrants were appre-hended by officers of theRoyal Bahamas DefenceForce onboard‘Enduring Friendship’on June 20, 2019 nearCastle Island, just South

of Acklins. This group also

included three minors.They were transportedto Matthew Town,Inagua by the HMBS L.L. Smith and turnedover to Immigration

officials. A team of officers of

the Enforcement Unitwere immediatelydeployed to Inagua toassist in processing, pro-tection and escort of themigrants.

Pierre Denies ArmedRobbery Charges

An alleged armed robberwas arraigned inMagistrate's Courtbefore MagistrateSamuel McKinney yes-terday. McKenzie Pierre, 26,

of Boyd Road, was

charged with four countsof armed robbery. Hewas not required to entera plea and was subse-quently remanded to theBahamas Department ofCorrections. It is alleged that on

Saturday June 15,Pierre, being concernedwith others and armed

with an offensiveweapon, a handgun, didsteal from Myril Storr acellphone valued $275and $350, the propertyof Storr. On the same date in

question, it is allegedthat he also stole fromChadwick Storr $87 andfrom Delano Johnson

$105. It is further alleged

that Pierre, again beingconcerned with others,armed with an offensiveweapon, stole fromCraig Smith a cellphonevalued at $275 and$525. Just before his

remand, Pierre told the

Magistrate McKinneythat he is being electron-ically monitored andwas home on the date inquestion. However, Magistrate

McKinney informedPierre that should thematter go to court hecould request a printoutor a recording of his

whereabouts electroni-cally. Pierre was subse-

quently placed onremand until August 19,when he returns to courtfor a Voluntary Bill ofIndictment. The accused was rep-

resented by attorneyAlex Dorsette.

BY LICEC BASTIANJournal Staff Writer

A3The Bahama Journal

Wednesday - June 26th, 2019NationalNEWS

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WE’RE IN CRISIS

16 Injured in Tour Bus Crash

“You in a crisis. They’rerunning on telling peopleabout the engine will beready in October. Thesenew engines. That won’thappen. But since thewhite man say it, fine.But it will be ready inDecember that’s more ofa realistic situation. “But the fact is we will

be load shedding off andon until October,November. We in a crisis

so what you need to do, isyou need to accept thatand work with it and askthe government for $100million in order to oper-ate properly. “Right now, we are

operating on a very thinshoestring budgetbecause every penny isgoing down to CliftonPier to deal with theengines and nothing isleft to operate aroundtown. “We can’t even get

money to fix the trucksfor the guys to go out towork. So, guys go out inlittle cars to do what theyhave to do. But you can’tneglect your distributioncustomers in order foryou to put a show ondown at Clifton Pier.That is not the way tooperate the company andyou need to say to thegovernment, we needoperating money downhere.” Earlier this week BPL

promised that $2 millionrental generators areexpected to bring relief tothe load-shedding issue.But Maynard said therental company Aggrekois not fulfilling all of itspromises.“They are spending a

mint to rent those genera-tors,” Maynard said.“This is why they shouldbe very annoyed withAggreko. Aggreko camein here and supposed tohave given them an addi-

tional 25 megawatts andthat would have coveredthem. “We wouldn’t have

had a weekend like thisweekend if Aggreko haddone what they were sup-posed to do. Aggrekowas supposed to be inhere and they would havesupposed to deliverbetween the 4th of Juneand the 11th. They weresupposed to be runningwith 25 megawatts andthey were not. They kept

moving the bar and keptblaming employees.“Everything is ready forthem now. They are noton yet. This is a prob-lem. They are not doinganything for us for free.We are paying anabsolute mint to havethem here they need toget with the program.“We need to say,

‘Look here man get withit or carry you and allyour damn machines outthis country.’”

Princess Margaret andDoctors Hospitals.Some of the injured

Americans were airliftedto the United States onMonday.Dr. Sands told reports

that in the majority ofcases, the injuries are notsignificant.“The seriously injured

– six. We had just a phe-

nomenal response fromthe team on the ground.From EMS in Eleuthera tothe doctors and nurses inEleuthera all overSouthern and CentralEleuthera,” Dr. Sandssaid. “The air ambulance, the

U.S. Coast Guard, we alsohad a phenomenalresponse from PrincessMargret Hospital, DoctorsHospital and EMS on the

ground here.“It demonstrated an

absolute fine example ofwhat teamwork in the set-ting of a mass casualtyevent. We don’t want tosee this type of thing, butwe do know that certainlyour teams are capablehanding it.” Sadly, Monday’s acci-

dent came as tourism con-tinues to enjoy much suc-cess. In fact, an extremely

concerned Minister ofTourism DionisioD’Aguilar said he wasgrateful there were nocasualties. Still, he is confident

the incident will not neg-atively impact the num-ber one industry.“I don’t think so. It

was just a genuine acci-dent. I think the vehiclefor whatever reason thedriver lost control of the

vehicle, we don’t knowwhy yet, and it was justand accident, that’s justwhat it was,” Mr.D’Aguilar said.“Accidents happen and

obviously we try to takeas many steps to mitigatethese accidents, but Idon’t think that this willput a blemish or a blackmark on the destination.“I just think it’s an

accident that can happen

at anytime, anywhere, toanybody.“Thankfully, there

were no fatalities andhopefully everybody isgetting first class medicalcare to try and rectify anyinjuries that theyincurred.” Thirty-two people

were on the tour buswhen the driver reported-ly lost control of the vehi-cle and overturned.

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threatened as much lastweek after reaching animpasse with negotiationsfor a new industrial agree-ment.Morton contended that

its latest proposal of 1.5per cent was its final andbest deal, but that theunion was unwilling tomeet at the table in goodfaith.Ms. Brown said other-

wise and charged in arecent letter that after

exceeding Morton’s budg-et by 799 tons, the unionwas eager to get back tothe table for a counter pro-posal.Still, the union opted

not to attend monthlymeetings as nothing wasbeing accomplished.Ms. Brown made it

clear that when the com-pany decides to giveworkers what is due tothem, the union will bewilling to return to thetable.Minister of Labour

Dion Foulkes yesterdayreiterated the call for thetwo sides to refrain fromany action that couldaffect the plant’s opera-tion.“Both management and

the union have agreed toholt any anticipated orproposed action. On theunion side, they havedecided not to engage in

any industrial action,” hesaid. “On the management

side, they have agreed tohold off on any potentiallock out of the plant. “We are trying to set up

a meeting as soon as pos-sible, the lead negotiatorfor Morton resides inChicago and we’re tryingto confirm a date that’s

convenient for Mr. ObieFerguson who is the leadnegotiator for the union.” Mr. Foulkes plans to

meet with both sides bynext week in hopes ofhashing out a resolution tothe standoff.“I want to emphasize

that this is a top priorityfor the prime minister, thisis a top priority for the

government to have thematter at Morton Salt set-tled,” Mr. Foulkes said.“Matthew Town,

Inagua is a one companytown in terms of the eco-nomic activity there andwe want to ensure that thelivelihood of all of theworkers and the residentsis secured in MatthewTown.”

A4 The Bahama Journal

Wednesday - June 26th, 2019 NationalNEWS

‘Threats to Lock Out Morton SaltEmployees Frustrating,’

Charges Dropped for 80-Year-Old LawyerAccused of Stealing

Progress BeingMade in Resolutionof Trade Disputes

Particulars indicate thaton Friday December 10,2010, Curling did dishon-estly appropriate theamount of $85,000 vestedas a trustee and stole thesame amount by reason ofservice. During the initial pres-

entation of the facts, attor-ney Jomo Campbell, whorepresents Curling,requested the matter bewithdrawn as he informedthe court that the com-plainant was in possessionof a cheque in the amountof $35,487.50, the sum hesaid was some 50 percentof the total owed. He further noted that

Curling, began in earnestto return the funds to thecomplainant, and that thebalance would be paid onor before July 9. He noted that the

request to withdraw wasas a result of the two par-ties coming into an agree-ment to have the balancepaid by the said date. The magistrate howev-

er, said the matter canonly be withdrawn withleave of the court, ques-tioning whether it wasreally the decision theprosecutor wanted tomake and sought to have

the complainant in thecourtroom. Further, Magistrate

McKinney was con-cerned that if the balancewas not paid by theagreed date, where thematter would stand. Attorney Darren Bain,

who represents the com-plainant, RebeccaKnowles, confirmed tothe court that his clientwas indeed in possessionof the cheque and was, infact, at the bank at thetime. He further suggest-ed that the magistrategive a mention date toreturn to court to verifythat the balance wasindeed paid, because ofMcKinney's concerns. The matter was then

stood down for about 30minutes. When the matterresumed, Knowles, whoarrived in court sometimelater, withdrew her com-plaint after being ques-tioned by the Magistrate. Magistrate McKinney

withdrew the charges,and Curling was subse-quently released fromcustody. The balance ofthe amount owing mustbe paid by July 9 or thematter could return tocourt.

were recorded at theDepartment of Labour,102 were resolved and164 are pending. Eightwere withdrawn and ninewere referred to theIndustrial Tribunal,”Minister Foulkes said. A look at the first

quarter of 2019 put thatnumber here in NewProvidence at 245 dis-putes.“One hundred and nine

were resolved, 82 arepending, 21 were with-drawn and 33 werereferred to the IndustrialTribunal.”

“In the first quarter of2019 in the FamilyIslands there is a total of85 disputes filed. Ninety-five were resolved, 49are now pending, twowere withdrawn and 9were referred to theTribunal. Senators also heard

how since the launch ofthe labour on the blocks,1,600 people have beensuccessful in findingjobs.The program’s to be

expanded to address jobvacancies in the maritimesector.

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