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FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2021
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Healthcare ‘disaster’ if no expanded NHI By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
T
HE Bahamas will face a healthcare “disaster” if National Health Insurance (NHI) does not fulfill its potential, an exhealth minister has warned, urging: “We must get past this ‘deep state’ debate.” Dr Duane Sands, who held the Cabinet post until mid-2020, told Tribune Business that “political buy-in” and access to the necessary financial resources were critical for the scheme to expand and meet its mandate of “ending medical apartheid” by
• Ex-minister urges end to ‘medical apartheid’ • Urges nation to move past ‘deep state’ debate • Calls for ‘doubling down’ on healthcare investment
DR DUANE SANDS
providing affordable universal health coverage (UHC) to all Bahamians. Acknowledging that critics will argue the government-run and funded scheme will prove unworkable, and be too costly for businesses and the economy to bear post-COVID-19, Dr Sands instead argued that The Bahamas must “double down” on increased healthcare investment following the pandemic. He asserted that the
“opportunity cost” of doing nothing to improve access to better health outcomes would be more expensive for The Bahamas in the long-run than taking action via NHI now, even though admitting that his nation already spends more on healthcare than most other countries. Dr Sands said The Bahamas was spending its healthcare dollars
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Property tax woe ‘a colossal mess’
By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
LEADING realtors yesterday branded the real property tax system “a colossal mess” that needs to be outsourced to the private sector after it was revealed that up to 40 percent of bills go astray. Mario Carey, the Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate MCR Group Bahamas principal, told Tribune Business that it was “just crazy, crazy” for the Department of Inland Revenue (DIR) to still be relying on the mail system to dispatch annual real property tax bills when the world has long moved into the digital age. With the Auditor General’s Office pegging outstanding real property tax arrears at more than
• Top realtor suggests private sector outsource • Calls for auction-off warning as ‘wake up’ call • Colleague says 2021 bills only arriving now
MARIO CAREY
MARLON JOHNSON
DAVID MORLEY
$600m some two-and-ahalf years ago, Mr Carey argued that it was impossible to “have a country with no income tax and a dysfunctional real property tax collection process” such as exists in The Bahamas and not escape a fiscal crisis.
Suggesting that administration and collection be fully outsourced to the private sector, he added that the government should “put teeth in it” and issue a nationwide alert that all properties with outstanding taxes owed have one year
to settle or agree a payment plan for the arrears otherwise they will face foreclosure and auction. Asserting that this will act as a “wake up” call for delinquent taxpayers, Mr Carey
Airline industry faces $3.7m Customs debt By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net THE Auditor General’s Office has urged Customs to collect millions of dollars in unpaid taxes and fees, including $3.747m collectively owed by 13 airlines as at end-June 2018. The government’s financial watchdog, headed by auditor-general Terrance Bastian, pictured, in its examination of the government’s accounts for that year noted that sums ranging up to $1.483m owed by an individual airline had been outstanding for
up to five years. While none of the airlines were named, and no distinction was made between Bahamian and international carriers, the report said of the service charge and
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Bahamas ‘inconsistent’ in anti-corruption battle By NEIL HARTNELL and YOURI KEMP Tribune Business Reporters THE US government says The Bahamas’ anticorruption laws have been “inconsistently applied” amid a decades-old system of political patronage that has “plagued” the country. The federal government, in its 2020 investment climate report on The Bahamas, said the country’s track record on combating bribery and other forms of corruption leaves something to be desired. “The government has laws to combat corruption
of, and by, public officials, but they have been inconsistently applied,” the report said. “Reports of corruption, including allegations of widespread patronage, the routine directing of contracts to party supporters and benefactors, and wealthy and/or politically connected foreign nationals and permanent residents receiving favourable treatment have plagued the political system for decades.” While giving, or receiving, a bribe from a public official is a criminal offence under the Prevention of Bribery
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Aliv gains network ‘ownership’ through $24m loan payback By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
ALIV has gained “ownership” of its mobile network equipment by paying off a $24m loan with the proceeds from long-term debt advanced by its controlling shareholder, its top executive has revealed. Damian Blackburn told Tribune Business that the $70m financing provided by Cable Bahamas, its 47.25 percent shareholder that has board and management control, completes the final stage in the mobile operator’s funding strategy. Acknowledging that the 18 months required to put the Cable Bahamas funding in place had taken longer than anticipated, something he blamed on a combination of Hurricane Dorian and COVID-19, Mr Blackburn said Aliv was confident it now has the “right structure” in place. Describing the funds advanced by the BISX-listed provider as “long-term patient capital”, the Aliv chief said one of the advantages was that no repayments of interest or principal are required until the mobile operator has repaid its combined $130m bond and preference share investors. Having completed its national network buildout and initial subscriber acquisition/market penetration phases, Mr Blackburn said Aliv had been seeking long-term debt financing to complete its funding strategy but no other attractive options emerged. “We explored that for 18 months, different options for secured financing,” he revealed to this newspaper. “It was a period of economic turbulence, first with
DAMIAN BLACKBURN Hurricane Dorian and then COVID-19. We did obtain some options, some commercial bank debt financing options, but after careful consideration the Board and shareholders decided to take the offer that was made of a $70m secured loan from Cable Bahamas.” The government, as majority 52.75 percent owner, would have had to agree to the move. “The primary use of the funds is refinancing,” Mr Blackburn added. “The first use of the funds was to repay the $24m network lease financing we had taken from Bank of China and ING. “That equipment lease financing financed the purchase of the network equipment. The advantage of refinancing is that we have already started to repay those lease financing loans, and we don’t have to repay them over time. We paid that $24m off with the proceeds, and as a result of paying that full ownership of the network equipment transfers to Aliv.” The Aliv chief said a further portion of the $70m, some $27m, was used to cover payments that Cable Bahamas had previously deferred for allowing its mobile affiliate to use its infrastructure - namely its
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