Fox Hill MP Fred Mitchell is the most complex and enigmatic personality in active politics today.\u00a0 He is one of the leading members of the Progressive Liberal Party and obviously one of several PLP parliamentarians hoping to succeed Prime Minister Perry Christie in 2017.<\/p>\n
At least two other Cabinet ministers are also aspiring to one day become prime minister: Deputy Prime Minister Philip Brave Davis and Tourism Minister Obie Wilchcombe.\u00a0 Davis has somewhat of an edge over Wilchcombe and Mitchell by virtue of him being Christie\u2019s deputy.\u00a0 But being deputy leader of the PLP and deputy PM is not an automatic guarantee that you will one day become prime minister.<\/p>\n
The whistleblower believes that Davis can go head to head with Mitchell in a PLP national convention for the leadership position and win.\u00a0 But that does not necessarily translates into an election win for the PLP with Davis at the helm.\u00a0 Davis might be well liked by his constituents in Cat Island, San Salvador and Rum Cay and by hundreds of grassroots voters in New Providence, but he is woefully lacking in charisma, is not a captivating speaker and is devoid of effective communication skills.<\/p>\n
Mitchell possesses those assets and is the most intellectually astute PLP in the House of Assembly, bar none.\u00a0 Indeed, Mitchell can run circles round Davis when it comes to delivering an address and would make mince-meat out of him in a debate.\u00a0 Mitchell\u2019s academic credentials are impressive.\u00a0 He received his tertiary education at Antioch University, Harvard University and the University of Buckingham.\u00a0 The former ZNS broadcaster edited the now defunct Herald newspaper \u2013 a newspaper of the PLP.\u00a0 It is alleged that he continues to write for an Internet news source which is a radical PLP mouthpiece.\u00a0 This can help explain Mitchell\u2019s open hostilities against The Nassau Guardian and The Tribune.\u00a0 Mitchell\u2019s latest rant against The Guardian for lauding former Prime Minister Hubert A. Ingraham in an editorial during his contribution in the 2013\/2014 budget debate on June 5 is just another prime example of his age-long enmity against the noted publication for no obvious and justifiable reason.\u00a0 Concerning The Guardian article on Ingraham, Mitchell stated in the House that it was \u201cone load of nonsense writing by some worthless sycophant\u201d.<\/p>\n
The whistleblower isn\u2019t too sold on Mitchell\u2019s purported loyalty to the PLP, however.\u00a0 He is an opportunistic political journeyman who has knocked from pillar to post until he finally decided to settle down and nail his boots in the PLP, despite being the late Prime Minister Sir Lynden Oscar Pindling\u2019s fiercest political opponent in the eighties.\u00a0 Indeed, it was Mitchell who burned a copy of this country\u2019s sacred document called the Constitution near the Supreme Court and sent the ashes to Pindling.<\/p>\n
In late 1990, Mitchell said that it is time that Bahamians consign Pindling to the scrap yard of history.\u00a0 The back and forth between the father of the nation and the man the PLP years ago dubbed a Johnny-come-lately to the PLP and a troublemaker stooped to new lows.<\/p>\n
Even for an era fraught with scandals, allegations of corruption and the illicit drug trade, the exchanges of both men crossed the boundary of decency.<\/p>\n
The whistleblower is convinced that the only reason Mitchell is giving the PLP the time of the day is because it is the one party which affords him the opportunity to fulfill his number one dream of becoming prime minister one day.<\/p>\n
His second dream is to become United Nations secretary general and his third dream is to travel the entire world.\u00a0 Since May 2012, Mitchell has already traveled to Morocco, Abu Dhabi, Chile, New York, Jamaica and Los Angeles.\u00a0 He has also informed the nation via his budget address that he will spend a significant amount of time in the Middle East in the next several years.\u00a0 I wonder how Fox Hillians reacted to their MP\u2019s travel plans?\u00a0 It wouldn\u2019t surprise the whistleblower if Mitchell ever announces his plans to visit the moon.\u00a0 At the rate he is travelling, anything is possible.<\/p>\n
The whistleblower is somewhat perplexed as to how Mitchell managed to wiggle his way into the PLP \u2013 even to the extent of being on the precipice of becoming the next leader of the party.<\/p>\n
Mitchell\u2019s greatest asset in the PLP appears to be his staunch opposition to Hubert Ingraham and the Free National Movement.\u00a0 He seems to believe that if he shouts that he dislikes the FNM loud and long enough, the top brass in the PLP will hand over the leadership mantle to him \u2013 thus paving the way for the realization of his greatest dream.<\/p>\n
Interestingly, though, Mitchell used to be an FNM and had even served in the Senate during the FNM\u2019s very first term in high office, thanks to Ingraham.\u00a0 In addition to being a member of both major political parties, Mitchell was leader of the People\u2019s Democratic Force and the Third Force party.\u00a0 When Ingraham was the independent MP for Cooper\u2019s Town, he was courted by Mitchell to join his fringe party in 1989.<\/p>\n
Ingraham\u2019s refusal to field him as a candidate for the FNM might be the reason for his relentless and uncalled for antagonism against the former FNM leader.<\/p>\n
In his budget debate, Mitchell said that the era of Ingraham was an era of boorishness and insensitivity.\u00a0 The whistleblower concedes that Mitchell has a beautiful mind.\u00a0 But he is of the view that Mitchell, due to his erratic behavior and pronouncements in the past, would not bring the kind of stability and soberness to the office of prime minister that this country desperately needs.<\/p>\n
The whistleblower doesn\u2019t want the PLP to win in 2017, but with Bahamians being who they are one is left with a few hard choices to make.\u00a0 To the whistleblower, deciding which PLP MP should become PM is like picking your poison.<\/p>\n
If the whistleblower had his say in the impending leadership race for the PLP, he would advise all right-thinking stalwart councilors of that party to steer far away from Mitchell.\u00a0 After all, he is not a real PLP.<\/p>\n
By:\u00a0 The Whistleblower<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Mitchell, due to his erratic behavior and pronouncements in the past, would not bring the kind of stability and soberness to the office of prime minister that this country desperately needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10223285771444175_51037792744":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[142,60],"class_list":["post-36518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinions","tag-incompetence","tag-plp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36518\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}