Date: July 11, 2001

I believe it appropriate for me to communicate to other members of the Commission my Party’s views on how we ought to discharge our responsibility.As I understand it the Commission is directed to review the number of Constituencies and Boundaries of those Constituencies into which The Bahamas is divided.

I have read Article 70(2) of the Constitution which gives us no guidance on the principles to be applied in our review.It gives us no more than the general statement that the number of voters in each constituency so far as reasonably practicable shall be the same.A similar general statement is also made which is obviously directed to the Family Islands and justifies a departure from the first consideration of equality of numbers in every Constituency.

Before indicating to you the principles upon which the Constitution ought to be guided I have to bring to your attention the statements of principles which go to the objectivity and integrity of the Constitution made by the Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Hubert A. Ingraham, with which my Party is in complete agreement.

On Monday 11^th May 1992 Mr. Ingraham, then Leader of the Opposition, made the following statements with regard to the need for an Independent Boundaries Commission without Members of Parliament on behalf of the FNM and I quote him:

“The Electoral and Constituencies Boundaries Commission that I seek to have established in our country should be responsible for the conduct of elections in our country………”

“There are hardly any countries in the Commonwealth or elsewhere that permit politicians to cut boundaries.The temptation is too great for either side, too many personal and party considerations are involved.And it doesn’t matter whether they have the label of PLP or FNM in them, there will still be too many personal and party considerations involved in the cutting of constituency boundaries.The urge to gerrymander and to protect oneself and one’s party and self interest is too great.”

“Make Members of Parliament an excluded group who are disqualified from serving on a constituencies commission.Secondly, establish by law, if not by Constitution, the parameters and the guidelines for a constituencies commission.”

“………it was the FNM’s considered view and judgment that boundary changes ought to be taken out of the hands of a Constituency Commission which is made up of a majority of Government members.”

“In terms of politicians cutting the boundaries I wouldn’t wish to have it for our country and I wouldn’t wish to see it in the hands of my party’s government after the next election either.”

Notwithstanding this position of high principle stated by the Prime Minister and adopted by his Party in its Manifesto the same old system remained in place dominated by the majority party in 1997 and continues today 9 years later.

The truth of Mr. Ingraham’s prophecy that “the urge to gerrymander and to protect one’s self and one’s party and self interest is too great” was amply evidenced by the FNM which controlled the commission in 1997.A comparison between the General Election results in 1987, 1992 and 1997 will illustrate the point which Mr. Ingraham makes at least for the FNM’s behaviour.

In 1987 the PLP drew Electoral Boundaries.In that year the PLP won the election.The FNM polled 39,007 votes or 43.2% of the votes and won 16 seats or 33 1/3% of the seats.

In 1992 the PLP again drew Electoral Boundaries.In that year the FNM won the election.The PLP polled 50,264 votes and won 16 seats or 33 1/3% of the seats.

But in 1997 the FNM drew the Electoral Boundaries.Again the FNM won the election.The PLP polled 46,933 votes or 41.9% and won 6 or 15% of the seats.

If boundaries were drawn fairly and democratically it would not have altered the outcome of the election.However, it would have altered the number of seats won by the PLP.42% of the votes ought to have meant 12 or 13 seats for the PLP not 6.

I believe that the result was engineered by a Commission which clearly moved polling divisions for one Constituency to another to guarantee particular results for the FNM.Quite apart from the manipulation of votes in the New Providence small polling divisions and small constituencies this was only possible because the Commission lacked guidance on the principles to be applied in conducting their review.

It seems to me that this is a necessity contemplated by the Constitution.Article 70(9) provides Parliament may by law provide for an appeal to the Supreme Court against a recommendation submitted by the Commission to the Governor General as to the number and boundaries of constituencies.Therefore constitutionally the Commission ought to be viewed as a quasi judicial body subject to appeal to the Supreme Court.This imposes a duty on the Commission to act judicially in accordance with the guidance of the principles applicable to the recommendations.

Additionally the fact that the recommendations of the Commission is submitted to the Governor General highlights the intention of the Constitution that the Commission’s work be seen to be non-political and objective uninfluenced by political considerations.

Although thereafter the recommendations are submitted to the House of Assembly with or without recommendations by the Prime Minister at least when Mr. Ingraham spoke on these matters in 1992 he was clearly of the opinion that political cutting of boundaries was objectionable when he said, “I wouldn’t wish to see it in the hands of my party’s government after the next election.”This certainly means that except for technical medications the Prime Minister would not make any substantive changes to the Commission’s recommendations.

It would be my suggestion that the Commission, before it begins its review this year, agree and formally adopt certain principles for their own guidance which will reflect their objectivity.

I am therefore prepared to offer my own suggestions as to the principles by which we should agree to be guided.

1.Number of Constituencies

Equal weight is given by the Constitution by the words of Article 70(2) which provides for two incompatible principles in arriving at numbers of votes being so far as is reasonable being the same in each constituency and the need of taking into account special Constituencies which are enumerated.

We should agree that the overriding principle ought to be to arrived at a number of seats which takes into consideration both the above principles so long as each vote carries the same weight and value for everybody in The Bahamas.

Having regard to the fact that roughly two thirds of the population lives in New Providence this equality of weight and value ought to be achieved if two thirds of the seats are in New Providence and one third is in the rest of The Bahamas.In practice the perfect democratic solution in applying this principle would be 27 seats in New Providence and 13 in the remainder of The Bahamas.Those islands to which “special considerations” have to be applied have to be accommodated which makes a distribution of 24 seats in New Providence and 16 in the Family Islands as much dilution of the New Providence votes as tolerable as New Providence could stand.This is the present position.

2.Boundaries of Constituencies

If there is to be fair and democratic representation in Parliament it follows that boundaries must be drawn on the base of some fundamental principles which reflect the compatibility of voters in the same Constituency.In other words socio-economic groups ought so far as possible be kept together; communities ought not to be divided.The nature of representation to be fair ought to take account of the majority of constituents; this is inevitable.By putting together two diverse socio-economic groups, particularly where the less affluent class is in the minority, is bound to ensure under-representation of that class.The reverse is also the case.

The Commission ought to be guided by the principles that representation ought to be fair.Divided communities produce unequal representation for voters which is inconsistent with our system of democracy.We ought to adopt this principle as fundamental to our review.

3.Other Matters

(a)The Commission ought to act in a timely fashion so that at least 3 months should elapse between the adoption of the recommendations by the House of Assembly and Election Day.

(b)In the event of boundary changes of Constituencies the Commission ought to formulate provisional recommendations and publish them in affected districts for public comment.

(c)Political Parties ought to be requested to submit to the Commission their views as to how boundaries ought to be redrawn.The Parties ought to be allowed to present their recommendations to the Commission in writing with maps and orally for a full explanation of their proposals.

(d)Not less than 50 voters n any affected Constituency may be permitted to make representation with regard to any provisional recommendations and representatives may appear before the Commission.

If the above guidelines were implemented it will partially but not completely satisfy the concerns of Mr. Ingraham to bring a level of integrity to the Commission.