Prime Min­is­ter of the Ba­hamas, Phillip Davis, said on Wednes­day he had ac­cept­ed the res­ig­na­tion of Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Clay­ton Fer­nan­der, as the fall­out con­tin­ues from the in­dict­ment by US law en­force­ment au­thor­i­ties of a se­nior Ba­hami­an po­lice of­fi­cer on charges of con­spir­a­cy to im­port co­caine, as well as pos­ses­sion and use of firearms last week.

“I have have met with the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice. I have re­ceived and ac­cept­ed his res­ig­na­tion. The Com­mis­sion­er has served the force with dis­tinc­tion, and I want to em­pha­size that there are no al­le­ga­tions of wrong­do­ing against him,” Prime Min­is­ter Davis told Par­lia­ment.

He said the Roy­al Ba­hamas Po­lice Force (RBPF) “needs change” and that he has since “iden­ti­fied a high­ly qual­i­fied suc­ces­sor who is well-suit­ed to over­see the nec­es­sary re­form.”

“This ap­point­ment re­quires con­sul­ta­tion with the Leader of the Op­po­si­tion (Michael Clifton Pin­tard). I ask the clerk to de­liv­er this let­ter to the Leader, which I in­vite him to re­ceive and dis­cuss with me at the ad­journ­ment of Par­lia­ment to­day,” Davis said.

He added that he is con­fi­dent that Pin­tard “rec­og­nizes the ur­gency of con­sult­ing with me swift­ly so that I am able to make a rec­om­men­da­tion to the Gov­er­nor-Gen­er­al.”

In a na­tion­wide broad­cast on Sun­day night, Fer­nan­der said the ar­rest of the se­nior po­lice of­fi­cer, Elvis Cur­tis, was “not just shock­ing; it was dev­as­tat­ing”.

He said the in­dict­ment out­lines al­le­ga­tions against Cur­tis that raise se­ri­ous ques­tions about ac­tiv­i­ties that al­leged­ly be­gan in May 2021, and that he has al­ready spo­ken with for­mer com­mis­sion­er of po­lice, Paul Rolle, who served from March 2020 to Ju­ly 2022, and that he in­tends to con­tact for­mer com­mis­sion­er, An­tho­ny Fer­gu­son, who served from Oc­to­ber 30, 2017, to March 29, 2021.

“In ad­di­tion to for­mer lead­ers out­side of the Force, I in­tend to reach out to for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr. Hu­bert Min­nis and for­mer min­is­ter of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty Mar­vin Dames, who were in of­fice from 2017-2021, dur­ing the pe­ri­od in which the al­leged crimes are said to have be­gun,” Fer­nan­der said.

Min­nis has since said he would pre­fer to ap­pear be­fore a com­mis­sion of in­quiry in­stead of hold­ing talks with the po­lice com­mis­sion­er.

Last Wednes­day, Prime Min­is­ter Davis told leg­is­la­tors that the rev­e­la­tions by the Unit­ed States au­thor­i­ties link­ing mem­bers of the RBPF and the Roy­al Ba­hamas De­fence Force (RBDF) strike at the “core of who we are as a na­tion”.

“Madam Speak­er, this House and the Ba­hami­an peo­ple de­serve an­swers,” he said.

He al­so stat­ed that the gov­ern­ment of The Ba­hamas “will act de­ci­sive­ly to en­sure that those re­spon­si­ble for these breach­es, re­gard­less of rank or po­si­tion, are held ac­count­able.”

Davis told Par­lia­ment on Wednes­day that he has since “tak­en steps to ad­dress breach­es of trust with­in our law en­force­ment agen­cies, in­clud­ing meet­ings held with se­nior of­fi­cials dur­ing which we dis­cussed re­form and the ur­gency of restor­ing trust.”

“I al­so met with the U.S. Charge d’Af­faires, who con­firmed she had been in re­ceipt of a for­mal diplo­mat­ic note re­quest­ing the dis­clo­sure of the name of the high-rank­ing Ba­hami­an politi­cian men­tioned in the in­dict­ment,” he said. “The for­mal diplo­mat­ic note was is­sued to un­der­score the se­ri­ous­ness of the mat­ter.”

Prime Min­is­ter Davis said that the ques­tion arose as to the ar­rest of Ba­hami­ans in­dict­ed who are in the coun­try.

“Fol­low­ing a for­mal re­quest for in­ter­dic­tion, we will co­op­er­ate in the ar­rest of the Ba­hami­ans named in the in­dict­ment,” he said.

He not­ed that he has asked the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty, Wayne Munroe, to in­tro­duce leg­is­la­tion to es­tab­lish an In­de­pen­dent Com­mis­sion of In­ves­ti­ga­tions for pub­lic con­sul­ta­tion.

“In­de­pen­dent over­sight will play a vi­tal role in build­ing trust be­tween the po­lice and the com­mu­ni­ties they serve,” PM Davis added.

The Ba­hamas prime min­is­ter said he will an­nounce fur­ther changes at the lead­er­ship lev­el of the Roy­al Ba­hamas Po­lice Force in the com­ing days.

“In ad­di­tion, the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty will in­tro­duce to­day new leg­is­la­tion to cre­ate an in­de­pen­dent over­sight au­thor­i­ty for all of our law en­force­ment agen­cies. In­de­pen­dent over­sight will play a vi­tal role in build­ing trust be­tween the po­lice and the com­mu­ni­ties they serve.

“I want to say a word to the many po­lice of­fi­cers who work hard, stay away from trou­ble, and face dan­ger dai­ly in or­der to pro­tect the rest of us. Keep your heads up. The work you do is more im­por­tant than ever. You have our grat­i­tude and our re­spect. And you will have the changes nec­es­sary in the force to en­sure you can fo­cus on your jobs with­out fur­ther dis­trac­tion,” he as­sured.

Prime Min­is­ter Davis said that the trust be­tween the po­lice and the peo­ple “is es­sen­tial to pre­vent­ing crime and to solv­ing crime, and thus es­sen­tial to cre­at­ing the safer com­mu­ni­ties we all yearn for.”

“To­day, we are tak­ing im­por­tant steps to re­store trust and ac­count­abil­i­ty,” he added. —NAS­SAU, Ba­hamas (CMC)