Rick Lowe

My long time friend Mr. Pierre Dupuch seems most upset that the government has allowed a foreigner owning Bahamian property permission to dredge a channel for his boat in the Exuma Park.

I think The Bahamas National Trust dealt with the matter very adequately and politely in their recent release. Mind you, there is nothing to prevent others from objecting to governments postion of course.

Mr. Dupuch uses an analogy made by a caller to a radio show he was guest on recently that goes something like this:

If a Bahamian were to want to to put a resort where one of the Pyramids are, they would be asked to leave Egypt.

But to convey that dredging "less than .0035%" of the Exuma Park to knocking an entire pyramid down is well… I think you know where I'm going with this.

And I'm sure if the owner of Bell Island wanted to dredge the equivalent of the Great Pyramid of Khufu , in relative terms, he would probably have been denied.

That aside, it appears the anti foreign sentiment by both the caller and Mr. Dupuch, includes the assumption that Egypt is unfriendly to foreign investors.

Well it appears that Egypt is more foreign investor friendly than we are. See here… and here…

I have no problem if people want to protect the Exuma Land and Sea Park. That is admirable, even if they are misguided in this particular case (in my not so humble opinion). But I think attempting to create mistrust and acrimony for foreign investors is the last road we should go down unless we have evidence of fraud etc.

Also, someone has mentioned that they know of two Bahamians denied similar dredging permits. If so it would be improper discrimination. However, unless the individuals are prepared to air their case publicly we cannot judge government's decision in the Bell Island case.

Finally, it seems this looks like a political football and conspiracy theories rather than protection of the Exuma Land and Sea Park.