Lynden Pindling
| The Right Honourable Lynden Oscar Pindling |
|
|---|---|
 |
|
| Prime Minister of the Bahamas | |
| In office 10 July, 1973 – 21 August, 1992 |
|
| Monarch | Elizabeth II |
| Governor General | Sir Milo Butler Sir Gerald Cash Sir Henry Milton Taylor Sir Clifford Darling |
| Deputy | Arthur Dion Hanna |
| Preceded by | Inaugural holder |
| Succeeded by | Hubert Ingraham |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 22 March 1930 |
| Died | 26 August 2000 |
| Political party | Progressive Liberal Party |
Sir Lynden Oscar Pindling KCMG, OM, JP (22 March 1930 – 26 August 2000), is regarded as the "Father of the Nation" of the Bahamas, having led it to Majority Rule on 10 January 1967 and to independence on 10 July 1973. He served as the first black premier of the Colony of the Bahama Islands from 1967 to 1969 and as Prime Minister of the Bahamas from 1969 to 1992. He was leader of the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) from 1965 to 1997 when he resigned from public life.
Pindling won an unbroken string of general elections until 1992, when the PLP lost to the Free National Movement led by Hubert Alexander Ingraham. He conceded defeat with the words: "the people of this great little democracy have spoken in a most dignified and eloquent manner (and) the voice of the people, is the voice of God".
Pindling was a member of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom, and he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1983.
Contents |
[edit] Birth and education
Pindling was born on 22 March 1930 to Arnold and Viola Pindling in his grandfather's home in Mason's Addition, Nassau, Bahamas. Pindling's father was a native of Jamaica who had earlier immigrated to The Bahamas to join the Royal Bahamas Police Force as a constable. Lynden grew up on East Street in Nassau and attended the elite Government High School from 1943-1946. Following his graduation at the age of 16, he took a job as a junior clerk in the Post Office Savings Bank before travelling to London to study law. He received a Bachelor of Laws (LL. B.) degree from King's College, University of London in 1952 and was called to the English bar at the Middle Temple in February 1953 and to the Bahamas Bar in June 1953. At his call to the Bahamas Bar, Pindling publicly dedicated himself to the service of the Bahamas and the Bahamian people 'within and without the realm of pure law'.
[edit] Political career
| The Bahamas |
 This article is part of the series: |
|
|
|
|
Other countries · Atlas Politics portal |
By the end of 1953, Pindling had joined the newly formed Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) as its legal advisor. In 1956, he became Parliamentary Leader when the PLP Chairman and de facto leader, Henry Taylor (later Sir Henry Taylor), was defeated in the 1956 general election. Pindling was elected the party's Parliamentary Leader over the dynamic and popular labour leader Randol Fawkes (later Sir Randol).
On 5 May 1956, Pindling married Marguerite McKenzie (of Long Bay Cays in Andros at St Ann's Parish on Fox Hill Road in Nassau). The following month, he successfully contested Nassau's Southern District constituency in the 1956 General Election. Thereafter, he would win successive elections to the House of Assembly in 1962, 1967, 1972, 1977, 1982, 1987, 1992 and 1997.
On 27 April 1965 (a day known in Bahamian history as "Black Tuesday") Pindling delivered a speech in the House of Assembly accusing the white minority United Bahamian Party government of gerrymandering so as to perpetuate white political hegemony in The Bahamas. In a dramatic turn of events, Pindling ended his speech by taking the Speaker's Mace and throwing it out of a window onto the street (where PLP supporters had gathered in the hundreds) exclaiming, "this is the symbol of authority, and authority in this island belongs to the people... Yes, the people are outside, and the mace belongs outside, too!" The late Sir Milo Butler followed suit by hurling the Speaker's hourglass out the window as well, a symbolic protest of the strict time-limits that applied to speeches in the Assembly.
On 10 January 1967, the PLP and the governing United Bahamian Party (led by Sir Roland Symonette) each won 18 seats in the Assembly. Randol Fawkes (the lone Labour MP) voted to sit with the PLP, and Sir Alvin Braynan, an independent MP, agreed to become Speaker enabling Pindling to form the first black government in Bahamian history.
The Bahamas had previously been governed by an oligarchy of white merchants known as 'the Bay Street Boys' (and formally constituted as the UBP in 1958).
Pindling went on to lead Bahamians to independence from Britain on 10 July 1973. He is considered as the pre-eminent architect of the modern Bahamas, and is credited with achieving significant social change in a democratic and orderly process, as well as the introduction of major social security measures in the form of the National Insurance Scheme, and the formation of the College of The Bahamas, the Royal Bahamas Defence Force, among many others.
[edit] Accusations of corruption
In 1983, a report entitled "The Bahamas: A Nation For Sale" by investigative television journalist Brian Ross was aired on NBC in the United States. The report claimed Pindling and his government accepted bribes from Colombian drug smugglers, particularly the notorious Carlos Lehder, co-founder of the Medellín Cartel, in exchange for allowing the smugglers to use the Bahamas as a transshipment point to smuggle Colombian cocaine into the US. Through murder and extortion, Lehder had gained complete control over the Norman's Cay in Exuma, which became the chief base for smuggling cocaine into the United States.
Lehder boasted to the Colombian media about his involvement in drug trafficking at Norman's Cay and about giving hundreds of thousands of dollars in payoffs to the ruling Progressive Liberal Party, but Pindling vigorously denied the accusations, and made a testy appearance on NBC to rebut them. However, the public outcry led to the creation in 1984 of a Commission of Inquiry to investigate the drug trade and official corruption in the Bahamas.
A review of Pindling's personal finances by the Commission found that he had spent eight times his reported total earnings from 1977 to 1984. According to the Inquiry: "The prime minister and Lady Pindling have received at least $57.3 million in cash. Explanations for some of these deposits were given... but could not be verified."
It is an indication of the level of Pindling's popularity in the Bahamas at the time that, despite the scandalous claims made against him in the US media, he never felt the need to resign or call an early election. Even with the commission's report fresh in voters' minds, he led his party to another election victory in 1987.
However, in 1992 the opposition Free National Movement (formed by anti-Pindling factions in 1970) bested the PLP in the General Election, even though Pindling retained his South Andros seat.
In 2009, Pindling's alleged links to international drug barons came to the fore again when The Tribune, the Bahamas leading daily newspaper, reported claims by the PLP's former treasurer, Chauncey Tynes Sr, that Pindling had been heavily involved with drug czar Carlos 'Joe' Lehder, head of the Colombian Medelin cartel. Tynes said he suspected his son, pilot Chauncey Tynes Jr, was killed in the 1980s because of what he knew about Pindling's links with Lehder and the Colombian's cocaine transshipment operation at Norman's Cay in the Exuma chain. Tynes said his son had insisted repeatedly that Pindling was on Lehder's payroll, and claimed he had actually delivered boxes of banknotes on Lehder's behalf to the door of Pindling's Nassau mansion.
Tynes said that, although he didn't connect Pindling directly with his son's disappearance, he blamed him for creating the climate of criminality in the country which led to his son's demise. The revelations triggered street protests against The Tribune's managing editor, John Marquis, who had been targeted by demonstrators two years before when he was blamed for bringing down the Progressive Liberal Party government during a scandal involving the American starlet Anna Nicole Smith. The editor was subjected to a Labour Department inquiry after several Cabinet ministers tried to have him deported. Marquis, who was unrepentant, was described by his critics as 'a journalistic assassin'. Mass protests outside The Tribune's office caused a mile-long traffic tailback. Demonstrators yelled 'Marquis must go!' and brought in trucks carrying huge sound systems to boom home the message. A Bahamian commentator who supported Marquis received death threats and tracked the activities of three gunmen who were caught on CCTV cameras outside his office.
Tynes also revived doubts about Pindling's birth, claiming that his Bahamian mother was not his biological mother and he had been born outside the Bahamas. The Tribune published his disclosures and promptly received corroborative information from several sources suggesting that Pindling was actually born in Jamaica and spent the first few years of his life in the care of two aunts before being sent to Nassau to join his father, who was working as a policeman in the Royal Bahamas Police Force. Some of Pindling's former PLP colleagues said the truth about his birth had been known inside the party for years, but that it had been suppressed for political purposes.
Pindling's origins became significant during the early 1970s when he began deporting expatriate workers in support of his Bahamianisation policy. Doubts about his Bahamian birth gained credence when it was revealed that Pindling's birth certificate was issued 17 years after the event when he had applied to go to law school in London. He refused to say whether the certificate was issued on the basis of a sworn affidavit. Marquis published claims from sources in Jamaica who said a mountain village on their island regarded Pindling as a prominent 'son' of the community and on one occasion welcomed him as a homecoming hero while he was prime minister of the Bahamas.
[edit] Legacy
The FNM won a second landslide victory in 1997 and Pindling retired from politics shortly afterward. He was succeeded by Perry Christie. Three years later, on 25 August 2000, Pindling died after a prolonged battle with prostate cancer. He was buried on 4 September 2000 in a full state funeral. Pindling continues to be revered by many as the most dominant figure in Bahamian politics, though there is also a large body of opinion which suggests his activities in the 1980s tarnished his image badly. Many Bahamians[who?] refuse to acknowledge him as 'Father of the Nation' and say his behaviour laid the foundation of the rampant crime rate in the country today, with murders reaching a record high in 2010. In 2006, Nassau International Airport was renamed Lynden Pindling International Airport in his honour, but the move was criticised by many[who?] as a vote-winning gimmick by his successor as party leader, Perry Christie.
[edit] External links
|
|
|||||
