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40 for 40: Books for the Willie Mae Pratt School for Girls

I like a quiet birthday, and this year is shaping up to be that way. I’ll probably spend most of it reading. While there will be no party and there is no need for gifts, I’m inviting you to help do a ting!

For no particular reason, I have landed on the number 40. I would like for 40 (or more!) people to donate $20 toward the purchase of 40 books for the Willie Mae Pratt Centre for Girls.

I have always loved reading, and it has exposed me to worlds, peoples, challenges, and ideas that I would not have otherwise encountered. Books introduced me to new possibilities, exercising my imagination. They invited me to meet myself.

Reading is often presented as a skill we need to get through school and to secure paid work. It is, however, a delight. It is a way for us to enjoy ourselves, in solitary and collective ways. It is political. It is activating. It is a community builder. Young people need books, and they need to have the time and space to enjoy them and seize reading as a leisure activity.

In December 2024, I opened a feminist bookstore, Rabble! Bookshop in Poinciana Paper Press. Running the store is everything I dreamed it would be from childhood. It has also given me certain tools to access books, so all books for this initiative will be ordered through Rabble! Bookshop which will absorb all costs beyond list price.

I welcome you to join me in making a donation of 40 or more books to the Willie Mae Pratt Centre for Girls possible. Your part is just $20.

Here’s how we rock this:
– Cash: Drop it off to Rabble! Bookshop in Poinciana Paper Press at 12 Parkgate Road, Thursdays through Saturdays between 11am and 3pm
– PayPal: Visit paypal.me/aliciawallace to transfer funds
– Online Bahamian bank transfer: Email hello@rabblebookshop.com to receive account details

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Palestine Still Needs Us

Though it is not currently making news headlines, the genocide against the Palestinian people continues. More than 75,000 Palestinian people have been murdered, and tens of thousands of Palestinian people are missing. A ceasefire was announced by the U.S., but has, predictably, not improved the reality on the ground in Palestine. “Israel” continues to ration food, fuel, and medical supplies, leading to the health crises and deaths.

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the Arab League, and 19 countries including Egypt, Brazil, Norway, Spain, and Portugal have condemned the actions of “Israel” to further annex the West Bank. They noted that it is a “flagrant violation of international law” and called on “Israel” to cease its actions to alter the Palestinian territory. The statement said the recent actions “are part of a clear trajectory that aims to change the reality on the ground and to advance unacceptable de facto annexation.” It noted that “such actions are a deliberate and direct attack on the viability of the Palestinian state and the implementation of the two-state solution.” The signatories clearly stated its opposition to any form of annexation. “In view of the alarming escalation in the West Bank, we also call on Israel to put an end to settler violence against Palestinians, including by holding those responsible accountable,” the statement said.

Global Sumud Flotilla

Global Sumud Flotilla—an organized movement to end the siege on Palestine—is organizing its Spring 2026 sailing to break the siege and deliver supplies to Palestine. It is set to be the largest mission, this time with 100 boats and 3,000 participants committed to nonviolence. The crews will include doctors, nurses, teachers, and people of various professions and skills to establish sustained civilian presence and support the Palestinian people. The delegation will include people from 47 countries including Bangladesh, Canada, Chile, Germany, Jordan,
Libya, Malaysia, Mexico, Pakistan, Poland, Thailand, and the U.S. In its appeal for support for the mission, Canada Boat Gaza said, “The blockade is a tool of genocide, being used to starve Palestinians, and to deny access to lifesaving supplies like medicines, fuels, and shelters. In the face of this genocide, we must escalate our efforts to
break the siege.” It added, “Flotillas are a legacy for solidarity, they are a symbol of collective struggle and collective liberation. Despite the illegal attacks on our efforts, we continue to come back.”

Flotilla Goals

The five interlinked targets of the Global Sumud Flotilla, as stated by the organizers, are:

1. Breaking the Siege: Challenging Israel’s illegal naval blockade of Gaza.

2. Delivering Life-Saving Aid: Transporting urgently needed food, medicine, and essential supplies.

3. Supporting Reconstruction: Accompanying Palestinians through early rebuilding efforts of homes, schools, hospitals, and civil institutions.

4. Confronting Complicity: Mobilizing global civil society to challenge the governments and institutions that enable Israel’s illegal blockade, occupation, and mass atrocities.

5. Catalyzing Global People-Powered Action: Turning the flotilla into a catalyst for coordinated land and sea actions that amplify Palestinian voices and mobilize people worldwide where institutions have failed.

The organizers said, “This moment in history requires collective participation. Guided by the Palestinians’ steadfast struggle for liberation, our coalition of everyday people and movements is mobilizing communities worldwide to act. Together, we rise against apartheid, racism, imperialism, colonialism, ecocide, and all systems of oppression.”

In September 2025, the Global Sumud Flotilla led “Israel” to direct its military to pursue its vessels. This allows Palestinian people to access their own water to fish for the first time in years. This is one example of the small wins that are possible and that occur, even as the large, primary goals may seem impossible to achieve.

To support the mission, visit chuffed.org and search for “Global Sumud Flotilla – The Second Mission” to make a donation. The goal is currently €1 million and the campaign has raised €214,000. To directly support Palestinian people, donate eSIMs to help them to stay connected to one another and to the world: connecting-humanity.org/donate.

Recommendations

The Runner Stumbles. The box office at The Dundas is now open for the 2026 Ringplay season. The Runner Stumbles opened last week and the last opportunities to see it are February 26 to 28. Tickets are $37.50 at tickettailor.com/events/shakespeareinparadise, or they can be purchased at $35 at The Dundas box office on Mackey Street..

All We Want is Everything: How to Dismantle Male Supremacy, by Soraya Chemaly. Join Feminist Book Club, hosted by Equality Bahamas and Poinciana Paper Press, in reading All We Want is Everything this month. The publisher said, “All We Want is Everything offers both unflinching analysis and genuine hope, informed by the Bold and revolutionary potential of feminist imagination. From private relationships to global politics, Chemaly shows how naming and refusing male supremacy is essential to resisting the force tearing democracy apart. This fresh, timely, clear-eyed, and necessary manifesto is a call to refuse supremacist identities, relationships, and values in order to build more just, healthy, and sustainable worlds for everyone.” The discussion will take place at Poinciana Paper Press on Wednesday, March 18 at 6pm. To join the club and receive email updates, go to tiny.cc/fbc2026.

The Earth Breathes Every Season. This exhibition at Poinciana Paper Press features work by Tracy Assing, Candida Cash, Lisa Codella, Sonia Farmer, Erin Greene, Monique Johnson, Carol Sorhaindo, and Natalie Willis Whylly. It opened on Saturday, February 14 and the work will remain on display for the next two weeks, open to the public Thursdays through Saturdays from 11am to 3pm. “In the latest exhibition at Poinciana Paper Press, seven artists contend with the tethers and portals found in the landscape around them, creating connections between eras,
islands, and each other. Whether floating between worlds, excavating a wound, or sitting with the stillness of a breaking headline, each artist stands in the gap of what is unsaid to midwife its exhale. Experimental poems, prints, and books channel these encounters, collapsing wisdom and wonder into powerful play and embodied insight.”

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Lessons we could learn from MLK

Monday, 19 January, 2026 was Martin Luther King Jr. Day. After criticism for not recognising the day, the President of the United States released a proclamation to “honour the brave men and women who remain steadfast in their commitment to law, order, liberty, and justice for all.” While previous proclamations on the federal holiday included mention of continued work toward racial justice, the one issued this year avoided mention of race, racism, and the treatment of black people in the country.

In contrast, former president Joe Biden delivered a speech at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta (once led by Martin Luther King Jr.) in 2023. “It’s still the task of our time to make that dream a reality, because it’s not there yet,” he said. “To make Dr. King’s vision tangible, to match the words of the preachers and the poets with our deeds. The battle for the soul of this nation is perennial. It’s a constant struggle. It’s a constant struggle between hope and fear, kindness and cruelty, justice and injustice, against those who traffic in racism, extremism and insurrection. A battle fought on battlefields and bridges, from courthouses and ballot boxes to pulpits and protests.”

Every year, on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, there are arguments about the man, his work, and his legacy. Many try to use excerpts from his speeches and writing to justify their action and inaction where the rights of all people are concerned. “Today, let us remember Martin Luther King as he TRULY was: A black radical anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, revolutionary Christian internationalist who was deemed an enemy of the State and assassinated for his radical work,” Marc Lamont Hill said earlier this week. “Just about everything else is a lie.”

As we find ourselves in the midst of global upheaval with human rights violations filling the news, it is useful to turn to King’s words and the message he consistently delivered. There is no excuse for inaction.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

For more than two years, the genocide enacted against the Palestinian people by Israel has been broadcast to the world. Many have ignored the cries of Palestinian people who have been terrorised in every way possible: from denial of basic needs including housing, food, and water to experiencing tremendous loss to witnessing the destruction of their land and murder of their family members, friends, and community members. Many have somehow managed to believe that the genocide in Palestine is separate from the lives we live in other parts of the world. They think we have no part in violence inflicted. They do not see how easily we could be on the receiving end of the same violence, due in part to our refusal to rebuke it and withdraw our participation, however indirect.

There have been many signs that Palestine is being used as a testing ground. Oppressors are not only testing equipment and various kinds of technology, but international law and both the apathy and the resistance of people everywhere. Events in Venezuela and commentary by the US government on Greenland certainly give an indication of the far-reaching consequences of silence on violence and injustice inflicted on people, whether or not it is seen to be contained by borders.

“Empire never stops at one place. Gaza was the test. Greenland, Venezuela, Iran now loom as the victory’s bounty. [Is this the beginning – of a new world (dis)order?] What goes around comes around, and fools are those who didn’t see it coming,” Francesca Albanese recently posted on X.

UNRWA reported on January 20 that its headquarters in Al-Quds (referred to as East Jerusalem) was stormed early in the morning. “On January 14, Israeli forces stormed into an UNRWA health centre in East Jerusalem and ordered it to close,” they reported. “Water and power supplies to UNRWA facilities – including health and education buildings – are also scheduled to be cut in the coming weeks. This is a direct result of legislation passed by the Israeli parliament in December, which stepped up existing anti-UNRWA laws adopted in 2024.”

In addition, UNRWA said, “These actions, together with previous arson attacks and a large-scale disinformation campaign, fly in the face of the ruling in October by the International Court of Justice, which restated that Israel is obliged under international law to facilitate UNRWA’s operations, not hinder or prevent them. The court also stressed that Israel has no jurisdiction over East Jerusalem.”

United Nations experts, including independent experts on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order:

Special Rapporteur (independent experts appointed by  the UN Human Rights Council) on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living, and on the right to non-discrimination in this context;

Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance;

Special Rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons;

Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights in the context of climate change;

Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health;

Special Rapporteur on the right to food;

and Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967 spoke out against the ban imposed by Israel against 37 organisations providing aid in Palestine.

“The ban is not an isolated act,” the experts said, “but part of a systematic assault on humanitarian operations in the occupied Palestinian territory and another step in the deliberate dismantling of Gaza’s lifeline.”

“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor. It must be demanded by the oppressed.”

Where, laws, policies, and courts fail, there must be people who stand together and raise their voices to speak truth and make clear demands for justice. This is not limited to protest signs and chants, petitions, or even organised acts of civil disobedience. It includes strategic decision making at the personal and community levels to affect the economy and, by extension, the ability of governments to fund war and genocide.

“The problems of racial injustice and economic injustice cannot be solved without a radical redistribution of political and economic power.”

While Martin Luther King Jr. spoke to the laws and policies that create and maintain such (concentrated) power, redistribution can and must include our own practices. The Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement calls on people everywhere to be intentional with our spending, refusing to give money to companies that support Israel in its genocidal action against Palestine and Palestinian people.

It requires that we break away from our habits of picking up the same products we always have, watching the same movies we always have, and keeping our money in the same banks and investment portfolios that we always have. It requires vigilance. It requires research. It requires a commitment to people, like us and not like us, and a set of shared values that include equality and justice, and that commitment must outweigh the exhaustion and laziness that capitalism levies against us. We have to push past inertia to take responsibility for everything that is in our power, making decisions that eliminate or reduce harm to others and move us toward a world of peace and equality.

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

In a post on X, Bernice King invited people to remember her father by taking the following actions:

1. Amplifying and advocating for the end of state-sanctioned and facilitated violence against black and brown immigrants and against people, period.

2. Speaking up for people who are suffering genocide in Sudan, Palestine, Congo, and other nations.

3. Calling and writing your Congresspersons in support of democracy as opposed to dictatorship.

4. Supporting policies to eradicate poverty (higher minimum wage, affordable housing, etc)

5. Learning the truth about and challenging anti-black racism, which is still prevalent in healthcare, media, lending practices, the criminal “justice” system, etc.”

Recommendations

1. Join Feminist Book Club with Equality Bahamas and Poinciana Paper Press. This evening, Feminist Book Club is meeting at Poinciana Paper Press, 12 Parkgate Road, to discuss Theory and Practice by Michelle de Kretser. The selection for next month is P. Djèlí Clark’s Ring Shout, “a dark fantasy historical novella that gives a supernatural twist to the Ku Klux Klan’s reign of terror.” Ring Shout will be discussed on February 18 at 6pm. Register to join Feminist Book Club and receive updates at tiny.cc/fbc2026.

2. Exhibition openings at National Art Gallery of The Bahamas. On Thursday, January 22 at 6:30pm, What the Landscape Holds, an interactive exhibition by Jason Bennett of The Bahamas and David Gumbs of Saint-Martin, opens. It invites us to “step directly into constructed environments shaped by synthetic materials and technology, where everyday objects are transformed into immersive landscapes that can be touched, moved through, and activated by the viewer.” On the same evening, War Dog: Teeth, Thorns, and Iron, new works by Reagan Kemp opens in the Project Space. “Through painting and ceramic works, Kemp draws inspiration from Ajagunda, the warlike manifestation of the Yoruba orisha Obatala, reflecting on guardianship, survival, and the fragile line between defence and harm.”

3. Pot Luck: Cartoons from The Guardian and The Tribune of the 70s and 80s, featuring works by renowned artist and architect Eddie Minnis, opens at the National Art Gallery of The Bahamas on Friday, January 30 at 6:30pm. The exhibition includes a “vital body of editorial cartoons that captured the pulse of Bahamian life at a time when public discourse looked very different, yet feels strikingly familiar today.”

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The politics of power

In a military operation, the United States abducted Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores from their home in Caracas. Maduro and Flores are now being held at the Metropolitan Detention Centre in Brooklyn, New York. They were taken to court on Monday, January 5. Maduro, when asked to confirm his identity, stated that he was kidnapped on January 3, and was cut off by the judge.

Discussions about the abduction and the subsequent statement by the US president about “running” Venezuela are going in many different directions. Some people, very unfortunately, believe it’s an attempt to bring stability to Venezuela, ignoring evidence to the contrary. Others believe it’s a move to control the oil. Still others see it going even further than oil, using it to inflate the value of the US dollar. Some point to the US fear of BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and trade outside of the US.

This is certainly not about establishing a legitimate government in Venezuela.

There’s a tremendous amount of history to digest on the subject to fully understand what took place on January 3 and the path that not only Venezuela, but the world, is on. Venezuela has experienced economic booms and busts since the discovery of oil in the Maracaibo Basin in the 1920s.

In the 1970s, the oil embargo imposed by the Organisation of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) on countries backing Israel, led to an exponential increase in oil prices and revenue in Venezuela. In 1976, President Carlos Andrés Pérez created Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA), nationalising the oil industry and securing 60 percent equity in joint ventures.

Oil prices dropped in the 1980s, which significantly impacted the Venezuelan economy and led to a financial bailout by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 1998, Hugo Chávez became president and his decisions, including gutting PDVSA, led to a decline in the oil industry and the conditions for an authoritarian regime.

In 2007, the oil industry was partially nationalised, and foreign companies were required to partner with Venezuelan companies, which had to hold 50 percent ownership. Exxon sued for damages over nationalisation and Venezuela was ordered to pay $1.4 million. This was later annulled. Exxon resubmitted its claim and was awarded $76 million in 2023.

Maduro succeeded Chávez and maintained his position in 2018, in an election that was considered undemocratic. Economic sanctions were imposed by the US government in 2017.

In recent years, Venezuela has experienced a decline in oil production, increased debt, hyperinflation, and increasing autocracy. Within the last year, we have seen María Machado—previously funded to overthrow Chávez—dedicate her Nobel Peace Prize to the US president, attacks on Venezuelan boats, threats to the national security of Venezuela, and leveraging of Trinidad and Tobago’s land, sea, and airspace.

The abduction of the president of Venezuela is an act of imperialism.

It is an overreach of the United States, extending power over another territory through military force. The US is attempting to display and exercise dominance over a sovereign country—one that has independent power to govern itself. And Venezuela is not a standalone case. It is, in fact, emblematic of a nefarious ambition to control resources and people.

“Gaza exposed the hollowness of western universalism, liberalism and globalisation,” Middle East Eye’s Sami Al-Arian wrote. “Venezuela extends the lesson into the western hemisphere, with a clarity that even allies cannot easily obscure. When legality is enforced only against opponents, as Gaza and Venezuela show, it ceases to function as law and becomes an instrument of power. And when aggression is openly linked to oil, empire stops pretending to be anything else.”

In response to alleged human rights violations in Venezuela, the United Nations Human Rights Council established the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela in September 2019.

Expert member of that mission, Alex Neve, was blunt in his assessment of the situation in the January 2026 report, titled “Venezuela: UN Fact-Finding Mission expresses grave concern following US military intervention and calls for accountability for human rights violations and crimes.

“The Maduro government’s longstanding record of grave human rights violations does not justify a US military intervention that breaches international law. Similarly, the illegality of the US attack does not in any way diminish the clear responsibility of Venezuelan officials, including Mr. Maduro, for years of repression and violence amounting to crimes against humanity. The Venezuelan people require and deserve solutions that fully comply with international law.”

The report expressed concern about the increased risk of human rights violations in Venezuela in the coming weeks, particularly as the United States government stated its intent to “run” Venezuela.

In a Facebook post on January 3, Menominee author, organiser, and educator Kelly Hayes was equally critical of the US government’s action, calling it a “fascist imperial power grab with implications for future foreign policy moves.” She noted that it’s also an indicator of the direction US democracy is taking. Hayes said the US president is acting out his fascist fantasies.

“We can hold compassion for the range of emotions Venezuelans may be experiencing — including positive emotions — and also be clear that regime change by a fascist superpower is dangerous, destabilising, and sets precedents that will not stop at Venezuela. Those aren’t contradictory positions,” she said.

Recognising the sovereignty of a country is not optional, regardless of the view anyone has of the way it governs itself. Foreign invasion does not bring great leadership. It’s for the people to rise up and stand together to create change. We need not see the Venezuelan case play out as the US intends, to understand that foreign invasion is dangerous and chaotic, negatively affects control of resources, prioritises extraction, and disproportionately impacts people in situations of vulnerability.

In her response to the January 3 press conference held by the US president, Venezuela-born campaign coordinator of CODEPINK Michelle Ellner made important points about the effects of war, sanctions, and military escalation.

“They fall hardest on women, children, the elderly, and the poor. They mean shortages of medicine and food, disrupted healthcare systems, rising maternal and infant mortality, and the daily stress of survival in a country forced to live under siege. They also mean preventable deaths, people who die not because of natural disaster or inevitability, but because access to care, electricity, transport, or medicine has been deliberately obstructed. Every escalation compounds existing harm and increases the likelihood of loss of life, civilian deaths that will be written off as collateral, even though they were foreseeable and avoidable.”

Ellner went on to challenge the assumptions made about the Venezuelan people: that they are and will be passive. With resistance, under circumstances like those created in recent days, comes a violence that is manufactured by oppressive forces, though often framed as unreasonable and caused by those who refuse to submit. The lack of unity in a country is not and cannot be a license for imposition by another.

“This moment demands political maturity, not purity tests,” Ellner said. “You can oppose Maduro and still oppose US aggression. You can want change and still reject foreign control. You can be angry, desperate, or hopeful, and still say no to being governed by another country.”

Do we live in a world where it is acceptable for one country to claim the right to control another?

What does it mean when a country can enact violence, operate outside of the law, and deem itself an authority on another country?

What are we called to do in the face of the genocide in Palestine and the imperialist threat to Venezuela?

“Power has displaced law, preference has replaced principle and force has been presented as virtue,” Howard University School of Law Professor Ziyad Motala wrote in Al Jazeera. “This is not the defence of the international order. It is its quiet execution. When a state kidnaps the law to justify kidnapping a leader, it does not uphold order. It advertises contempt for it.”

People are sharing opinions on this situation without sufficient information. It takes time and effort to access accurate information, process it, and come to a strong position. It’s easier—and irresponsible—to make assumptions based on headlines and snippets being passively shared on social media. In a Facebook post, Kelly Hayes reminded people that we need not make enemies of one another.

“The ignorance of folks who are flailing in their efforts to make sense of this moment does not make them the enemies[…] They are poor stand-ins for your actual enemies.”

This, of course, is not permission to shirk the responsibility to share information, challenge positions, and speak in support of human rights and the international laws that promote, protect, and uphold them.

It is a call to see the violent systems and the people who uphold them for exactly what they are, and to dismantle those systems in the interest of all.

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BDS For Palestine 2026

We are at the end of 2025 and people are thinking about the year ahead and all that they would like to achieve. Goals and resolutions are being set, and improved lives are being envisioned. There is significant focus on the self and the family at this time. In a few weeks, there will be increased attention on the country and its fate as related to the next general election. Zooming out from our immediate lives and geographic location, the global swing to the political right comes into view. The consequences have been and continue to be far-reaching. While it does not receive the necessary attention, the uninterrupted genocide in Palestine is one of the most horrific failings of our time, certain to reverberate all over the world and for many years to come. The refusal to see the connection between our struggles and the interdependence of our liberation is certain to determine our future. 

 

Even after more than two years of feigning or enjoying ignorance, today is a good day to start paying attention. It is a good day to commit to the development of a political ideology that does not discount the lives or the land of people we see as different or distance from ourselves, but demands solidarity with all people in situations of vulnerability. Our survival depends on it, especially as capitalism becomes more acceptable to the masses for whom it is devastating.  

 

At the United Nations General Assembly in September 2025, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 Francesca Albanese said, “As I argued in my last report to the Human Rights Council, this genocide has become profitable, unfortunately, not just for some corrupt private entities. And this is not only Israel’s crimes. This is the world’s crime sustained by silence, complicity, and the supply of funds, weapons, and political cover. History, we’ll remember, because it’s not that this is the first genocide that is been known. No, the Holocaust, the genocide in Bosnia, the genocide in Rwanda were also known to the people of the time. But this genocide happened because the world didn’t care enough to stop them, like today, or not. But today’s genocide is something different. It’s openly incited, cynically denied, and relentlessly supported, armed, and weaponized, while those who oppose it are silenced, beaten, criminalized, and smeared. This is why I say this is the shame of our time and the collapse of the international legal order in this moment, not only for the Palestinians, but for all of us.”

 

In an October 2025 address to the General Assembly from Cape Town, due to U.S. sanctions preventing her participation in New York, Albanese said, “International law is clear: States must neither aid nor assist in the internationally wrongful acts of others, and must prevent and punish international crimes. This requires immediately suspending all military, economic, and diplomatic ties with Israel until its crimes cease, and pursuing justice for the survivors by holding perpetrators and accomplices accountable.” 

 

To close the perceived distance between us the Palestinian people who are experiencing the genocide perpetrated by “Israel” and the Palestinian people in the diaspora, fiercely advocating to the lives and the land of their people, it is important to listen to their voices. Their stories are the truth we need to hear and feel. 

 

Nour ElAssy

“Since becoming a journalist, my life has unravelled in real time. Every time I have found a new place to stay, the bombs have found me again. The signal bars on my phone flicker like a dying heartbeat, and when the battery dies, which is often, I scramble – desperately searching for even a whisper of electricity just to send a photo, a sentence, a single update. Sometimes, I have to walk for kilometres through shattered neighborhoods to find a generator or a hotspot. All while airstrikes roar above me.

 

“But I keep going. I take testimonies from mothers standing beside the corpses of their children. From fathers who haven’t eaten in three days and have nothing to give their starving kids. From children who draw tanks instead of flowers. And I send them out to the world, praying someone, somewhere, will read them and feel what I feel[…] Every time I zip up my vest, I remember the face of the photographer who was burned alive. The videographer who lost his family while filming the ruins of another. This vest is not armour. It is a shroud. But I wear it anyway. Because my people need someone to tell the world what’s happening. Because silence is complicity. Because if we stop speaking, no one else will.” 

 

Omar Suleiman

“Thousands of children are dead. Thousands of children are under the rubble. Thousands of children are missing limbs. Thousands of children are missing parents. Thousands of children are fighting disease. Thousands of children are having surgeries performed on them without anesthesia. Thousands of children have been starved. Thousands of children have been bombed out of their homes. Every single child in Gaza has been forever traumatized. All of the above are war crimes. We can keep letting human rights organizations count them. Or we can finally hold them accountable.”

 

Sumayah Abu Qas

“Ousamah begged me to let him go there to get food, but I refused. I was afraid of losing him. In the end, I gave in to my daughters’ hunger. On the morning of 19 June 2025, Ousamah went to the aid distribution center by al-Bureij R.C. in the Netzarim compound with my brother Ahmad and some other friends.  That whole day, I was scared and anxious. Then, at 11:00 P.M., my brother came back with Ousamah’s body. He was covered in blood and dirt. Ahmad told us an Israeli tank had fired a shell at them and hit Ousamah in the back, killing him and five others while they were opening boxes of aid. They all died on the spot.” 

 

Ahmad al-Ghalban 

“We started packing up our things with my uncle Iyad Salem, 33, and his daughter Hibah, 6. Around 2:30 P.M., as we stepped into the street with our things, the army fired shells, and one hit us. I was seriously wounded. Muhammad was dying next to me, and my uncle Iyad was torn to pieces. Hibah, my mother, my sister Alaa, and my brother Qusai were about ten meters away. I lay on the ground, bleeding. I looked at my legs and couldn’t believe what I saw. I told myself, “This is a dream.” My mother screamed and called for help. Five minutes later, a man arrived, and when he saw we were still alive, he put Muhammad and me in a tuk-tuk and took us to the Indonesian Hospital, along with my uncle, my mother, and the others.

 

“On the way, Muhammad recited verses from the Quran and the Shahadatain prayers [recited before death], but I didn’t realize he was taking his last breaths. At the hospital, I was taken into surgery right away. It lasted four or five hours. When I woke up from the anesthesia, I found out they had amputated both my legs and four fingers on my left hand. My right hand was also broken, and they put a metal implant in it. I had shrapnel all over my body. I stayed in the ICU for five days.

“I didn’t know Muhammad had died. I kept asking about him, but my mother said he was hospitalized in critical condition at a-Shifaa Hospital. She was afraid to tell me because I was in a very fragile physical and mental state. I kept telling her, “I want to see Muhammad.” And every time I asked, “Why don’t you go visit him?” she said the doctors wouldn’t let her. After two weeks, when I was doing better emotionally, she told me Muhammad had died. I cried a lot because Muhammad was a friend, too. He was my twin brother. I couldn’t believe he was gone. I cried nonstop for five days. I never imagined I would lose him, or that I would lose both my legs.”

Abir Hamza El-Khawaja

“We used to have lives and dreams. Despite the fact the Gaza Strip has long been besieged, right now, it’s completely desolate. All that exists is destruction. It’s become apparent that our dreams may not come true, such as the ultimate dream of visiting Jerusalem, or Akka, for example. But beforehand, we were able to enjoy simple pleasures: We could go to work in the morning; we could eat our favorite food; and we could quietly read a book. We could enjoy watching the sunset over the vast sea, and people could play with their children. We could then return to our families at the end of each night and to a warm bed, where we could enjoy a favorite drink, in peace. This security disappeared from that moment, and it seems it’ll never return.

 

“In previous Israeli military assaults on the Gaza Strip, most people would stay in their homes. We were inevitably suffering from all the death, destruction and incessant bombing, but this time, it’s not like that. It’s annihilation, displacement and starvation. This time, they’re really taking our lives.” 

 

Noura Erakat

“As a Palestinian, my heart is very broken that a genocide can continue, that Palestinian babies can be slaughtered and there is a debate over whether or not that’s OK or how it should be done better. As a Palestinian, I’m so frustrated that rather than take aim at the oppressive systems that placed us in these conditions, like prolonged military occupation, apartheid and genocide, that we are made into a problem to be resolved. We are not the problem. These conditions that oppress us are the problem and should be what the international community targets to destroy, rather than allowing us to be the target of destruction.”

 

Diana Safieh

“How do we handle this [survivor’s] guilt? Some struggle and do nothing, while others, occupied with their own struggles, cannot engage. However, many of us feel compelled to do what we can for those who cannot. Our activism is driven by the belief that our survival obliges us to fight for justice and the rights of those in Palestine. This constructive action is crucial for our own survival. And many of us, at home and abroad, seek comfort in those non-Palestinians offering their solidarity, through kind words, marches and other forms of activism. 

 

“I do not want to end on a pious note, and yet I will. It is one’s duty to take advantage of all the opportunities life presents to you to make the world a more hospitable place for all of us[…] We must use our privilege to work toward a day when life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness will be afforded to us all.”

 

Act to End the Genocide

Boycott, divest, and sanction. This is what we, who support human rights, abhor violence, and work for liberation, are called to do. It is as wrong as it is easy and lazy to assume a position of powerlessness. We can choose to seek information and use it to make decisions that, at the very least, minimize harm. The BDS movement is growing, and the organizers are providing easily accessible information to help participants to avoid giving money to “Israel” and entities that support it. Google, Amazon, AirBnB, and Disney+ are among the companies targeted by the economic boycott. More information is available at bdsmovement.net/campaigns#2. Make 2026 the year that you spend as if the lives of others depend on it. They do. 

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Food Insecurity

“The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2025 – Addressing high food price inflation for food security and nutrition”—published by the FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP, and WHO—estimated that “between 638 and 720 million people, corresponding to 7.8 and 8.8 percent of the global population, respectively, faced hunger in 2024.” While hunger is expected to decrease between now and 2030, “512 million people are still projected to be facing hunger in 2030.” 

The FAO stated in “Latin America and the Caribbean Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition” that The Bahamas has a food insecurity rate of 17.2%. Food insecurity exists when people do not have access to enough nutritious food to support their growth, development for active, healthy lifestyles. The food insecurity rate in The Bahamas is cause for concern for many reasons. We know that there are noncommunicable diseases that are rampant in our population, affected by our diets and lifestyles. Many of us have also heard the stories of children going to school without having had breakfast and little or nothing provided for lunch. Food insecurity is directly related to poverty which not only affects people’s ability to pay for food, but the time to procure, prepare, and eat it. Taxation on food has negatively and disproportionately impacted people experiencing poverty, and there is little attention to this worsening issue. 

Addressing food insecurity requires a change in systems. While immediate, direct assistance is necessary until we reach a state of food security, it is not going to solve the problem. People need to be able to afford food. Both the import of food and the taxation on food are drivers of food insecurity. Combined with the lack of a livable wage, we have a dangerous situation. People are working full time, often holding more than one job, and still cannot afford to buy nutritious food. Some do not have a stove, and some do not have electricity. Many have to buy a few items every single day for their survival, unable to afford a “big shop” and/or unable to properly store food for more than one or two days. There are people who can buy enough food, but do not have the means (including time) to prepare it, so they opt for fast food or packaged food products. The circumstances vary widely, yet bring us to the same place. People are unwell, tired, underperforming, and stressed because of their inability to meet their most basic needs. 

When politicians come knocking, trying to secure your votes, ask them what they have done and what they plan to do to increase food security. Ask them what support through Social Services is like now, and how it will change in the coming five years. Ask them which schools have breakfast programs and which do not. Ask them how backyard farming will be encourage. Ask them about community gardens and food pantries in your constituency. Ask them about taxation, particularly on food. Tell them this is a priority issue, and that you need to see a plan for addressing it.

Between now and the point of food security, there are people who need help, and there are organizations working to fill the gap.

 

You can support:

  1. Hands for Hunger. This is a “humanitarian organization committed to the elimination of unnecessary hunger and the reduction of food waste through the creation of meaningful and engaging partnerships formed amongst all sectors of the Bahamian community” which engages in food rescue, food distribution, and education. Hands for Hunger operates a food pantry which enables clients to make their own selections from a variety of offerings. Donations can be made at handsforhunger.org/donate.
  2. Bahamas Crisis Center. This is a nongovernmental organization that provides free counseling services, particularly people experiencing domestic violence or related crises. It provides support to its clients beyond counseling, including through its food pantry. To donate, contact administration at 328-0922 to make arrangements.
  3. Bahamas Feeding Network. Thirteen organizations formed a group to “perform as a hub for the collection and distribution of food items and financial and physical resources to the entities that interact daily with thousands throughout the archipelago plagued with the uncertainty of knowing where their next meal is coming from.” Donations can be made at bahamasfeedingnetwork.org/donate.
  4. Soup kitchens. These are often operated by faith-based organizations. Find the one nearest to you and ask how you can help. From grocery shopping and delivery to serving and cleanup, there is no shortage of work to do.

 

Ways to Give

Cash. Few people seem to be willing to give money to people in need of assistance. Some want the gratification of purchasing items themselves and being able to give physical items. Some want to control what others—people in need in particular—consume, wanting people to have only what they deem acceptable. There is a serious people with the refusal to trust people in situations of vulnerability to make the best decisions for themselves. The fact is that people know what they need better than anyone else. Being able to purchase items themselves also prevents accumulation of individual products in excess, reduces storage issues, avoids issues with allergies and other dietary restrictions, makes healthier options possible, and allows for treats that might be otherwise overlooked. Giving cash recognizing people’s agency.

Gift certificates. An easy way to support people in different families and a wide range of situations is through gift certificates to grocery stores, pharmacies, and gas stations. This enables people to make the most appropriate selections available to them on an as-needed basis. At certain time of the year, like the holiday season in December, there is an increase in giving. There is only so much that each person and/or family can accept and consume in a short period of time. Gift certificates have a longer life, and make a great alternative to giving canned goods which are high in sodium. Those with cars appreciate the gift certificates for gas, enabling them to get to and from stores in addition to the school run, work commute, and job interviews. 

Fresh produce. When supporting a particular family or organization, be sure to include fresh fruit and vegetables. Onions, tomatoes, bell peppers, and lime go a long way in helping canned goods to reach their flavor potential. Bananas, apples, and oranges make great, quick snacks for everyone. If you have fruit-bearing trees, share the bounty. There is nothing quite like native fruit, and it is a special treat when discovered in a mix of necessities. 

Canned goods with manual can opener. When canned goods seem like the best option, remember to include a can opener to ensure that the people you are helping do not have an additional barrier. Choose a variety of canned goods. Be sure to include canned vegetables and beans. 

When people are sleeping in their cars and parked on lines for hours and hours to receive vouchers and food, it is clear that we have a problem. No one should have to do this for food. Sustainable Development Goal two is to end hunger, and 2030 is not very far away.

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Tribute to a true hero advocate: Alice Wong. RIP.

DISABILITY Justice Advocate, Founder of Disability Visibility Project, and writer Alice Wong died at the age of 51 on November 15. A MacArthur Genius Award-winner, Alice was known for her brilliant ways of presenting current realities and possibilities, fierce advocacy, openness about her life, and wonderful sense of humour.

Alice was born with muscular dystrophy. She used a powered wheelchair and assistive breathing device, and she openly shared her experiences in medical care settings, having home care, and the importance of care networks populated by people who listen.

“Care is not a checklist of tasks and responsibilities,” she said. “Care is a shared value and actions operating in a larger political context within a hyper-capitalist, racist, ableist society that devalues certain types of labour and bodies.”

Alice Wong wrote Year of the Tiger: An Activist’s Life (2022), and she edited Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century (2020) and Disability Intimacy: Essays on Love, Care, and Desire (2024).

Alice was generous in her engagement through her published work and her social media presence. She was quick to not only offer commentary on and guidance through the COVID-19 pandemic, recognizing it as a mass disabling event, but to support people with long COVID in navigating their new realities. Her writing in Teen Vogue felt not only personal to her, but to the people reading. It was a conversation.

In October 2022, Teen Vogue published an excerpt from Year of the Tiger: An Activist’s Life. In it, Alice emphasized the importance of self-acceptance and community, and she did so in a way that implicitly aligned with her position on institutions—that we should all try to be free of them, and instead lean on our communities and experience the highest form of care at home.

“Growing up and becoming more comfortable in our own skin is a tough, nonlinear process. I am still working on myself as I imagine you are, too,” she wrote. “In the midst of your challenges and searches, I hope you are taking time to find joy in the world. Building and nurturing relationships gives me joy. It might take a while, but you will eventually find people who have your back whether they have the same disability or come from the same culture or not. And maybe there aren’t any solutions or immediate answers to the questions you’re asking. All we can do is discover what or who makes us happy now.”

It was and is a message for young people, for people going through transitions, for people with disabilities, and for people who are learning how to be themselves.

Alice founded the Disability Visibility Project (disabilityvisibilityproject.com), which is an online community that centres and amplifies disability media and culture. She believed that “disabled narratives matter and that they belong to us.” Her goal was to “build online spaces for people to share, organize, and connect,” and to “organize and facilitate events, give presentations, and participate on panels.”

International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women

Next week Tuesday is the first day of the Global 16 Days Campaign, also known as 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence. As with many days, weeks, and months, it has been co-opted by various groups, including multilateral entities, whose related activities ignore the roots of the campaign, which are in feminist organizing. It is up to those of us who know better to do better, moving beyond the symbolic orange t-shirts and pins to undertake the change-making work that must be done year-round.

Tuesday, November 25 is also International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (IDEVAW). It is a day to acknowledge that women disproportionately experience gender-based violence. It is not a time for what-aboutism. It is not a time to wring hands about other groups of people and their particular experiences. It is a day to face reality: women experience gender-based violence at an alarming rate, worldwide, in the Caribbean, and in The Bahamas.

The report on the The Bahamas Women’s Health Survey was completed in 2022, and it has yet to be released. At a media briefing, some of the data was shared. One in every four women reported that they had experienced physical and/or sexual violence. More than one in every five women who survived physical and/or sexual violence did not talk to anyone about it. Sixty-five per cent of survivors of physical violence said it was severe (punched, hit with an object, dragged, choked, burned, threatened with a weapon).

Women are experiencing violence at high rates and high levels of severity. Many of them are not reporting to the police or seeking help elsewhere. They are suffering in silence, often hiding the horrific truth. We have built an environment that is unsafe for women in many ways. Violence has been normalized–survivors are often blamed for the violence they experienced– and it does not seem beneficial to report or even share what is happening with others.

We do not lack awareness. There are data and there are stories that let us know what is happening all around us, and that it does not just happen to certain “kinds” of women. We all know and love women who have experienced gender-based violence, and there are many among us who have not been deemed “safe people,” who would listen and offer support.

The approach to the issue of violence against women is ineffective. It does not centre the needs of survivors. It does not focus on eliminating stereotypes and systems that produce violence. It does not make use of available data to build coordinated reporting and care systems. It does not reach young people with critical information about consent, bodily autonomy, emotional intelligence, emotional regulation, nonviolent communication, or healthy relationships. It does not leverage international human rights mechanisms and the available resources to support systemic change.

As International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women approaches, find ways to:

•  Let people know that you are against violence and you are prepared to support women who have experienced violence.

•  Engage with your Member of Parliament or any candidate or party that wants your vote, applying pressure for them to articulate a plan to end gender-based violence against women.

•  Talk to the young people in your life about healthy relationships, red flags in relationships, consent, and nonviolent communication.

•  Pressure the current government administration to publish the report on The Bahamas Women’s Health Survey and to implement the comprehensive care model.

•  Push back against harmful gender stereotypes whenever and wherever you see them, including at home, in the workplace, and in social settings.

Recommendations

1.    Genocide Bad by Sim Kern. Publisher notes: “Part activist memoir, part crash course in Jewish and Palestinian history, Genocide Bad dismantles Zionist propaganda in 10 unapologetic essays. Drawing connections between Biblical promises and exploding pagers, medieval dress codes and modern-day apartheid, Kern sketches a sweeping history of imperialism with a characteristic blend of far-ranging research, pop-culture insights, and scathing humour.” Feminist Book Club, hosted by Equality Bahamas and Poinciana Paper Press is reading Genocide Bad this month, and meeting to discuss it on Wednesday, November 19 at 6pm. Register: tiny.cc/fbc2025

2.    Global 16 Days Campaign. This campaign, to focus on ending gender-based violence, begins on November 25 (International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women) and December 10 (Human Rights Day). Equality Bahamas is hosting its annual series of events during the campaign, and the full lineup is available at Lu.ma/16days25.

Events include a discussion about memory and reparations with The Bahamas National Reparations Committee Chair Niambi Hall Campbell-Dean on November 26 at 6pm, the screening of “Two Faced: Gender Inequality in The Bahamas” at the National Art Gallery of The Bahamas on November 27 at 6pm, and an erasure poetry workshop with Sonia Farmer at Poinciana Paper Press on Parkgate Road on December 6 at 9:30am. All events are free and open to the public.

Published in The Tribune on November 19, 2025.

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A liveable wage – essential, but still a pipe dream?

HERE have been several news stories on the cost of living in The Bahamas, the inadequacy of minimum wage, and the clear need for a living wage. These have sparked conversations that have not been sustained. Regardless, these conversations are often met with cries of impossibility from the private sector—rooted in fear and greed—and vague commentary from government about the need for change—rooted in personal comfort divergent interests.

Most people are working as much as they can already, often juggling more than one job to make ends meet, while people in positions of power decide that the wellbeing of the people is the least important element when there an inequitable economic system to maintain.

“When we call, as employees, for more money,” Minister of Labor and Public Service Pia Glover-Rolle said this week, “we must call for more productivity as well. I’m sure as business owners we can say we don’t mind rewarding with better benefits and better compensation packages when we see more productivity. So, we think that as a government, while we’re working to bring employee salaries and compensation to a good place and liveable place, we should also have the expectation that productivity is improved.”

This comment should be disturbing to anyone who understands the purpose of the liveable wage and the burden of labour and insufficient income on employees in the name of profit and financial gain for the owners of capital. To make an increase in productivity a requirement for a liveable wage is to ignore the reason it exists and its necessity in The Bahamas. No one should work full time and be unable to meet their basic needs with the income from that job. Businesses and the government may have productivity issues to address, but they are not relevant to the discussion on paying employees a wage that enables them to cover the cost of housing, food, water, transportation, and other necessities. Particularly as public services deteriorate further and force people to pay for education, healthcare, and other critical services that ought to be publicly funded and/or subsidized.

The International Labor Organization (ILO) defines a liveable wage as “the wage level that is necessary to afford a decent standard of living for workers and their families, taking into account the country circumstances and calculated for the work performed during the normal hours of work.”

Similarly, the Global Living Wage Coalition defines a living wage as “remuneration received for a standard work week by a worker in a particular [time and] place sufficient to afford a decent standard of living, including food, water, housing, education, healthcare, transport, clothing and other essential needs, including provision for unexpected events.”

The liveable, or living wage, is not a prize or a bonus. It is not a shiny bauble to dangle in front of people, trying to convince them to work more or work faster. It is a standard. It is a recognition that people work to get money that they then use to pay bills and acquire the items that not only sustain their lives, but that make it possible for them to continue to work. It is the bare minimum.

When people are not able to sustain their households with income from their full-time jobs, they have to find other sources of income. It is self-defeating to demand more work of employees than a 40-hour work week, because doing so contributes to the conditions that force them to take on additional paid work. And this reduces the time available for rest, which affects productivity.

“A Living Wage for The Bahamas: Estimates, Potentials, and Problems”, published in the International Journal of Bahamian Studies in 2021, captured the attention of Bahamians with its estimate that a basic decent standard of living for two adults and two children in a household requires $4400 per month in New Providence and $5750 per month in Grand Bahama.

“With statutory deductions included, our gross living wage estimate is $2625 for New Providence and $3550 for Grand Bahama,” the report said.

“Our New Providence living wage estimate is nearly 200% and 100% higher than the country’s national minimum wage and poverty line, respectively. These indicators not only confirm that the minimum wage rate does not ensure workers live above the poverty line but also suggests that much needs to be done to ensure that everyone who works can live decently.”

Three years later, in “How Much Does It Cost to Be Middle Class in The Bahamas?” author Lesvie Archer determined that a family of four needed a monthly income of $10,200 in New Providence, and $10,100 in Grand Bahama. The report also updated the cost of living for a working-class family of four, stating that “the 2024 cost-of-living estimate for a working-class family of four is $5,000 per month in New Providence and $6,600 per month in Grand Bahama.”

In November 2024, Prime Minister Philip Davis issued his response to the cost-of-living report. “From the outset, we raised the national minimum wage, provided public sector employees with much-needed promotions and pay adjustments, and reduced the duties on a number of imported items by Bahamian families. These changes are part of a phased approach to improve wages across the board, helping Bahamians earn a fair, liveable income.”

Raising the minimum wage did not solve the problem. It is still not a liveable wage. It is not enough to meet a person’s basic needs in The Bahamas. Promotions and pay adjustments are little more than campaign material, appearing to be something on the surface, but that have little effect on the systemic issues such as poverty.

“The challenges we face are complex and require bold action,” the prime minister said. “And we know that structural change takes time. But this government is committed to a fairer, more competitive economy that works for every Bahamian.”

In May 2025, Bahamas Chamber of Commerce and Employers’ Confederation (BCCE) labour division head, Peter Goudie, added his own thoughts on the matter.

“There is no appetite for [a living wage] at the moment. We haven’t done a study, so we really don’t know what it’s going to look like. And then you’ve got to worry about how you implement higher wages when business costs are still very high. There are a bunch of issues there.”

There is a clear misunderstanding–or clear action to produce misunderstanding–of the liveable wage, its necessity, and the role of people in positions of power to make it reality. People will sleep in cars with their children. They will leave their children with people they barely know to work a second or third job. They will eat cheap, unhealthy food and suffer health consequences. They will launch fundraisers to cover the cost of surgical procedures and participate in illegal activities just to get more money.

They experience mental health crises and often struggle to leave violent households. Very few of them ever make the news. But they listen to third-party commentary on the stories of the people who do. Suffering goes on with varying degrees of visibility. And there are financial and social costs to The Bahamas and to the people of The Bahamas.

These are the consequences of a system that government officials and business owners want us to believe is a good system that works and requires us only to “work hard.” It is easier to tell us that we simply do not work enough to earn the money it takes to have a decent life here.

It is more beneficial to them to convince us that our suffering is due to our own shortcomings, not due to the design of the systems that keep us down while we try to find ways to make them work for us. There will be no consensus from people focused on maximizing profit to pay a liveable wage.

It must be imposed.

A government administration must connect the everyday problems we see and complain about to everyday systemic issues.

It must see the issue as one worth solving, and it must champion the people. It must want to see every employee have a decent standard of living.

It must want that more than it wants to exploit us by seeing our needs and refusing to meet them, while offering temporary, ineffective increments in exchange for votes.

Published in The Tribune on November 12, 2025.

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Femicide in The Bahamas

THIRTY-YEAR-OLD Lauren Saunders, who was seven months pregnant, was reported missing last week, and her body was found in a bushy area days later. On Monday, a man known to her was charged with her murder. Her murder is a case of femicide—the killing of a woman or girl that is related to her sex or gender. In fact, it is a case of pregnancy-associated femicide.

As the government of The Bahamas continues to refuse to acknowledge the sex- and gender-based killings of women and girls as femicide, it is difficult to count these incidents, analyse them, and develop prevention and intervention mechanism.

It means, for example, that are not able to definitively state the rate of femicide in The Bahamas, the rate of pregnancy-associated femicide, or the rate of femicide by perpetrators known to the victims. The government prefers to pretend that it does not understand the term “femicide” and/or to refuse to use it, obscuring the severity of gender-based violence against women and girls and the rate at which it results in people being killed.

In the 2022 United Nations statistical framework for measuring femicide, ten indicators of femicide are identified. They include women and girls killed by intimate partners, women and girls killed by family members, previous record of harassment/violence, body disposed of in public space, sexual violence was committed before, and hate crime motivated by bias against women/girls.

There are specific laws, recording methods, and analytical tools in use that can be adapted to the Bahamian context, enabling us to create and share knowledge about femicide, and use that knowledge to end sex- and gender-based killings.

The passing of the Gender-Based Violence Bill would have at least moved us toward improved quantitative records and analysis of the murder cases resulting from gender-based violence.

Instead, the current administration tossed it aside, instead passing a the useless “Protection Against Violence” bill that does attend to the issue of gender-based violence and the resulting murders.

Along with abandoning the bill to amend the Sexual Offenses Act to criminalise marital rape, this is a clear indication of the complete disregard this administration—and every single person in Parliament—has for women and girls, regardless of their empty words.

This week, as with every other week with a report of femicide, there is significant attention to penalties. People continue to look to the judicial system for justice.

What number of years can the murderer spend in prison, funded by taxpayers, to undo the murder of 30-year-old Lauren? How many years would be sufficient to bandage the hearts that bleed for the unborn baby?

The truth is that the very few members of the public with no relation to Lauren Saunders will think of this case until there are reports of the voluntary bill of indictment being served in January 2026.

Shortly after the case updates appear in the news, the case will be forgotten again. For loved ones, however, it will never be far from thought. No prison sentence is enough.

Lauren Saunders, like so many others whose names have been forgotten, was murdered, and that cannot be undone.

Justice is not punishment. Punishment may be a component of justice, but it is does not right a wrong, it does not bring balance, and it does not result in equity. Punishment is a consequence of an action. Justice that centers the survivor brings the survivor as close to the life they had before the act as is possible.

In the case of femicide, living dependents can be considered survivors. This means the children of Lauren Saunders should not suffer the effects of the loss of her income. They should maintain the same quality of life as they would have if she was not murdered and could continue to work, received her salary and/or wages, and meet household needs. Justice is often viewed as individual, intended for one person, but our concept of justice must be expanded.

As a collective, we can consider justice to include action by the government to prevent femicide by addressing the issue of gender-based violence, acknowledging that it can be fatal.

With research showing that one in every four women in The Bahamas has experienced physical and/ or sexual violence and 65% of survivors of physical violence reporting that it was severe (eg they were punched, hit with an object, dragged, choked, burned, or threatened with a weapon), there is no denying that this is a high-risk environment and gender-based violence is a public health crisis.

The government is obligated to take action to address gender-based violence which will not simply cease to exist. In 2018, following its report and constructive dialogue on its progress, or lack thereof, in coming into compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the government of The Bahamas received the recommendation to “develop and implement comprehensive measures for the prevention and elimination of gender-based violence against women and girls, in particular domestic and sexual violence and rape, assess the reported incidence of crimes against lesbian, bisexual and transgender women and intersex persons and intensify efforts to change the social norms and cultural perceptions through which gender-based violence is tolerated as culturally acceptable”.

The CEDAW Committee also recommended that the government of The Bahamas develop an action plan to eliminate gender stereotypes, pass the Gender-Based Violence Bill and implement the Strategic Plan to Address Gender-Based Violence, and to ensure police and courts address complaints of gender-based violence quickly and efficiently. The government knows its obligations under international human rights law, and its responsibility to people in The Bahamas, to uphold all human rights. It fails to take action.

ABANDONED NEWBORN

A newborn, umbilical cord still attached, was found earlier this week, and a news outlet polled its social media audience on the introduction of “safe haven” or “baby box” laws, allowing people to safely surrender babies without facing criminal charges. This led to an array of comments expressing opinions on sexual and reproductive health and rights and the (un)availability of services.

“Ok so let me get this right: a law to say that after a responsible adult female has sex and finds out she got pregnant, she can carry her child nine months, deliver it somewhere, then put it in a box on a strangers doorstep. Then repeat this procedure the following years to come. My my…”

This person has already made an assumption that the person who birthed the baby is an adult and that the pregnancy is the result of consensual sexual intercourse. Even a cursory review of the news on a weekly basis would provide enough information to let anyone know that there is a high rate of rape in The Bahamas, and that teenaged girls are preyed upon by men who know that they are children and that the legal age of consent is 16. This person also seems to believe that pregnancy and motherhood are punishments for sexual activity. Is this the way we want people to become parents? Is there any thought to the way that many people parent when they forced into it?

“Could also just stop [having sex].”

Sex has more than one purpose. Some people have sex to conceive. Many people have sex to experience pleasure. Pleasure is good. By encouraging people to enjoy sex, and letting them know that it should absolutely be a pleasurable experience, we also encourage them to exercise consent, to recognise unsafe sexual relationships, and to value their experience at least as much as the other person’s.

“If The Bahamas adapt that law, the no good uncaring women will be dropping babies like flies and mosquitoes. They want to open their legs so let them be responsible.”

This person seems to think pregnancy and childbirth are fun. They also have a clear hatred of women. Enjoying sexual activity is not a commitment to have a baby. There is no good to come from forcing people to carry unwanted pregnancies to term and forcing them to parents babies they did not plan or want. Pregnancy is not a punishment for having sex. Babies are not a punishment for having sex. We need comprehensive sexuality education in all schools, access to contraceptives from the age of consent, and to end sexual violence.

“Adoption should always be an option. Give two babies up for adoption and we tie them tubes up.”

While some people may choose adoption, abortion must be legal and accessible. No one should be forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term. It is reprehensible to suggest a medical procedure such as tubal ligation without the consent of the person. A person who does not have to have a baby today may want to have a baby in two, five, or ten years. Everyone has the right to plan for their families and, as an extension of the right, everyone needs access to the resources to do so.

There were a number of comments that acknowledged the rights of women and girls and the realities of gender-based violence and the limited access to information about sexual and reproductive health education and services in The Bahamas. People mentioned the importance of Plan B being accessible to people who cannot afford to buy it, the need for comprehensive sexuality education that extends beyond one class, access to health care without a parent/guardian at the age of consent, and decriminalizing abortion.

As one commenter said, “Until our society stops shaming and ostracising women who become pregnant out of wedlock and [stops] treating CHILDREN who are raped who end up pregnant like they are lepers, none of this matters. Until we start holding the men who rape and impregnate CHILDREN [accountable], none of it matters. Until we give girls and women who become pregnant the ability to make safe choices without condemnation and humiliation and fear of lack, they will continue to make unsafe choices including not putting a baby in a […] box, on an island where NOTHING is sacred or secret.”

Published in The Tribune on October 29, 2025.

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Misogyny in politics holds women back

While Leslie Miller’s misogynistic, infantilising reference to Senator Michela Barnett-Ellis is not at all surprising, given his many public episodes, it has drawn attention to the longstanding issue of discrimination against women in political and public life.

The idea that women are inferior and must be relegated to the private sphere and men are superior and entitled to the public sphere persists well beyond the time that one income was sufficient and (some) women’s only work was in the home and in service to the family (which was never the case for black women).

That patriarchal arrangement was in service to capitalism, even more than it was for men, as women made (and still make) it possible for men to work through the provision of various unpaid services including the maintenance of the home and the people living in it and the reproduction of labourers.

Patriarchy created a hierarchy and it has required us to live according to this division, even after the point that women entered the public sphere and, as a matter of necessity, started to work for wages. Patriarchy assigned values and expectations based on gender and while the economic realities have changed and society along with it, patriarchy has its devotees.

Just as patriarchy separated women and men into the private and public spheres, it instilled the belief that men are to be leaders and decision-makers while women are to follow and submit.

Misogyny extends beyond the hatred of women to the hatred of all that is feminine. As emotions are viewed in a binary way, considered feminine or masculine, certain emotions are reserved for women and restricted for men.

On the basis of these socially constructed rules, it was determined that women are too “soft” and “emotional” for leadership, even as men regularly perform anger to the detriment of the people expected to follow them.

Women have worked, for generations, to gain access to opportunities to work and to lead through consistent efforts including, but not limited to, higher education. Today, men regularly attempt to use the level of education many women have attained, and subsequent professional success, as evidence that gender inequality does not exist.

They refuse to see the persisting issues including sexual harassment in the workplace, the gender wage gap, and the impediments to participating in frontline politics and public life.

Miller’s misogynistic comment is evidence of the discrimination that still exists and is not only an annoyance, but a barrier to equal participation and, ultimately, the representation of women in leadership at the level that is proportionate to the population. It also highlights the issue of intersecting forms of discrimination that women face.

A women vying for candidacy or for a seat in Parliament are not only unfairly judged rather than appropriately assessed because of their gender, but because of their (perceived) age, class, and other identities. Women are expected to be deferential and young people are expected to be deferential. Young women are expected to be doubly deferential should they even dare to be in the same space as men.

It is an embarrassment that only 18 percent of parliamentarians are women. No government administration has ever addressed this issue by instituting a political quota. Perhaps even worse, no political party has chosen to take the lead in addressing this issue, demonstrating commitment to achieving gender equality by instituting a quota at the party level.

This is clear evidence of the priorities and the cowardice of political parties. Temporary special measures such as political quotas have been recommended to The Bahamas on numerous occasions through international human rights mechanisms in which The Bahamas voluntarily participates.

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, in Article 3, obligates States to “ensure the equal right of men and women to the enjoyment of all civil and political rights set forth in the present Covenant.”.

Importantly, Article 25 states, “Every citizen shall have the right and the opportunity[…] to take part in the conduct of public affairs, directly or through freely chosen representatives [and] to vote and to be elected at genuine periodic elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret ballot, guaranteeing the free expression of the will of the electors.”

Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women (Convention of Belem Do Para) states in Article 4 that “Every woman has the right to the recognition, enjoyment, exercise and protection of all human rights and freedoms embodied in regional and international human rights instruments. These rights include, among others[…] The right to have equal access to the public service of her country and to take part in the conduct of public affairs, including decision-making”.

It continues, in Article 5, “Every woman is entitled to the free and full exercise of her civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, and may rely on the full protection of those rights as embodied in regional and international instruments on human rights. The States Parties recognise that violence against women prevents and nullifies the exercise of these rights.”

The Sustainable Development Goals were adopted in 2015, and goal five on gender equality includes “ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision-making in political, economic and public life” as a target. The indicators are the proportion of seats held by women in national parliaments and local government and the proportion of women in managerial positions.

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), also known as the bill of women’s rights, was ratified by The Bahamas in 1993—acknowledgement discrimination against women as a violation of women’s human rights and a commitment to take the necessary steps to come into compliance with the Convention in order to end discrimination against women.

Article 7 of the Convention calls on States to “take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in the political and public life of the country and, in particular, shall ensure to women, on equal terms with men, the right[…] to be eligible for election to all publicly elected bodies [and] to participate in the formulation of government policy and the implementation thereof and to hold public office and perform all public functions at all levels of government.”

As CEDAW was adopted in 1979 and entered into force in 1981, there issues that have emerged and knowledge that has since been created that are not explicitly stated in the Convention. To ensure that it can carry out its mandate and respond to the realities on the ground with its collective human rights expertise, the CEDAW Committee produces General Recommendations which expand upon Articles of the Convention, address areas of concern, and guide States in their reporting.

There are General Recommendations, for example, on violence against women, older women and protection of their human rights, rights of rural women, and gender-related dimensions of disaster risk reduction in the context of climate change. In 2024, the CEDAW Committee produced General Recommendation 40 on equal and inclusive representation of women in decision-making systems. It begins, “Women have the right to equal and inclusive representation in all decision-making systems on equal terms with men[…] This right is still not respected. This also seriously hampers implementation of all other rights under the CEDAW Convention.”

General Recommendation 40 was produced as a comprehensive guide for States “on achieving equal and inclusive representation of women in all decision-making systems across all sectors, aiming for a systemic change”.

It recognises seven pillars of equal and inclusive representation of women in decision-making systems, recognising “patriarchal structures impede women’s equal and inclusive representation in decision-making systems” and the need for a transformational approach that dismantles those structures. The pillars are:

1. 50:50 parity between women and men as a starting point and universal norm;

2. Effective youth leadership conditioned by parity;

3. Intersectionality and inclusion of women in all their diversity in decision-making systems;

4. A comprehensive approach to decision-making systems across spheres;

5. Women’s equal power and influence in decision-making systems;

6. Structural transformation for equal and inclusive decision-making;

7. Civil society representation in decision-making systems.

General Recommendation 40 is available online. It described all seven pillars and not only sets on the obligations of States, but provides guidance for meeting the obligations. Its recommendations include legal amendments to institutionalize 50:50 parity between women and men in all spheres of decision-making, adoption of a parity strategy, provision of education on temporary and permanent special measures, implementation of awareness-raising campaigns toward positive discourse on parity, cooperation with media to condemn, monitor and ensure accountability for sexism and misogyny, and prevention and prosecution of hate speech in decision-making and against women candidates.

All candidates, representatives, leaders, and members of political parties should read the document and contribute to moving The Bahamas toward compliance through all means available to them.

Published in The Tribune on September 10, 2025

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