bahamas

There is something deeply uncomfortable about telling children to be resilient when what they are being asked to endure is something adults have a responsibility to fix.

Education Minister Chester Cooper says power outages can become a “learning opportunity” — a chance to teach children resilience and perseverance.

Resilience is important, but resilience cannot become a substitute for reliable infrastructure.

Because this is not simply a child sitting through one inconvenient afternoon without electricity.

Teachers at C.C. Sweeting have protested after weeks of power failures, saying electrical problems have disrupted classes and created safety concerns. Teachers described classrooms without adequate cooling and lighting, while one teacher recounted students being traumatised after seeing sparks and burning from exposed wiring.

In Eleuthera, teachers and parents have also reported students being dismissed early because classrooms were hot and dark.

So perhaps the question is: “Why are children being asked to demonstrate resilience because the system cannot consistently provide the basic conditions necessary for them to learn?”

We should absolutely teach children perseverance because life will not always be easy.

But public education should not require children to tough it out through preventable infrastructure problems.

Teachers have a right to teach in an environment conducive to teaching and students have a right to learn in an environment conducive to learning.

And government has a responsibility to provide and ensure the infrastructure necessary for both.

And now, after an electrical incident at C.C. Sweeting left three students injured, the conversation about whether schools should simply continue operating becomes even more serious.

The lesson should be that the system needs to become more resilient–more reliable power, better maintenance, proper electrical capacity, faster repairs, clear safety thresholds, and accountability when basic infrastructure fails.

For those who knew Devontae Fleurimar, the 17-year-old was the boy with the unforgettable laugh; the student who could make his former principal joke about girls fighting over him; and the basketball player who had people imagining just how far his talent could take him.

Royalty Preparatory School, where Devontae was a 12th-grade student, remembered him simply: “We remember the laughter, the jokes and all the special moments we shared. He will be deeply missed and forever remembered.”

For his mother, Zoe Chyna, the pain is made even harder by how close her son was to reaching a milestone they had dreamed about together.

She imagined herself watching him walk across the stage, finally able to celebrate the young man he had become.

She remembered joking with him about how tall he was and looking forward to telling herself that she had done it, that she had gotten her son to that moment.

Now, instead of preparing to celebrate his graduation, she is preparing to bury him.

“God you could’ve done anything else and I would’ve been okay, my baby birthday in couple days yo,” she wrote after learning of his death.

“That boy was my heart, so this isn’t easy at all.”

Devontae died Sunday after reportedly encountering difficulties while swimming with three other teens in waters near South Sea Estates off Bacardi Road.

Police said they received information around 4:30 p.m. that a male had gone missing while swimming in a canal behind the community.

Matheo Smith remembers him from his own days as a principal, when Devontae was still in junior school.

Because of his distinctive surname, Smith said he rarely called him Devontae. He called him “Fleurimar.”

And he remembers a young man who was respectful, funny and full of personality.

Smith recalled teasing him about the attention he received from girls at school.

“Fleurimar, why you come to my school causing problems and having all these girls fighting over you?”

Devontae’s response would always come with that laugh: “Dr. Smith, it ain’t me man, it’s them.”

Those are the moments Smith says remain with him now.

Smith also remembers Devontae’s love for basketball. He believed the young player had something special.

“This is our next NBA star,” he would tell him.

But beyond the talent, Smith admired Devontae’s determination. He described a young man who could fall down and get back up — someone who kept pushing regardless of what came his way.

That is how he wants him remembered: Young, respectful, talented, driven and full of potential.

Those who knew Zoe Chyna say it was impossible to miss how much Devontae meant to her.

Friend Tatyana Petit remembered asking about her son and watching Zoe’s entire face light up as she spoke about him.

“She told me he was about to graduate,” Petit recalled.

She could hear the pride in the way Devontae’s mother spoke about her son.

Friend Shyquelle Chiann also remembered that bond, describing Zoe’s children as her “whole world.”

“When one mother cries, we all cry,” she wrote, offering prayers and comfort to the family.

Another friend, Shekeva Farquharson, remembered Devontae as “the sweetest young man ever from a child.”

As the Bahamas prepares to welcome King Charles III later this month, Buckingham Palace has made one thing clear: the King will not issue a formal apology for Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade, and no reparations will be offered during his Caribbean tour.

The announcement comes weeks after the Bahamas National Reparations Committee (BNRC) called on the British Royal Family not to arrive in the Bahamas “empty-handed,” demanding an apology for slavery and colonisation and renewed action on reparations.

King Charles is scheduled to visit The Bahamas from October 27–29, before travelling to Guyana and then joining Queen Camilla in Antigua and Barbuda for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting.

The Palace says the King will not shy away from Britain’s history.

A Buckingham Palace spokesperson said there are important discussions taking place about the colonial legacy and the intergenerational impact of the transatlantic trade in enslaved people. The Palace also pointed to the King’s previous description of slavery as an “atrocity” that “forever stains our history.”

But there will be a limit to what Charles says or offers.

The Palace says apologies and reparations are matters for governments, while the British Government has maintained that financial reparations are not the answer. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband recently reiterated that position.

That puts the King’s visit in an uncomfortable space.

The BNRC is asking for an apology and reparations and Britain is saying neither is coming.

And yet the King is not simply a foreign dignitary arriving in Nassau. He is King of The Bahamas and the country’s Head of State.

The Palace says the visit will focus primarily on the “vibrant present and promising future” of the countries Charles visits. But slavery, colonialism and reparations are already part of the conversation surrounding his arrival.

Songs filled the church and tributes followed through the tears.

Inside Change Ministries International Church on Saturday, family, friends and members of the University of The Bahamas community gathered to remember Dahphaney Maxine, a young woman whose presence had become deeply woven into the lives of those around her.

Dahphaney, an education major from Abaco, was found unresponsive in her university dormitory in August. But on Saturday, those who loved her chose to remember the life she lived.

Her brother, Josiah Valcin, spoke of a sister who had a way of making family moments special.

“My sister was one of the best,” he said.

Whatever he needed, he said, Dahphaney would find a way to help.

“When she came home, I was happy to see her,” he remembered.

Even when she told him she was broke, somehow, she would still find a way.

“I don’t know how.”

Dahphaney was a member of the University of The Bahamas Mingoes volleyball team, where Coach Raymond Wilson said she made an impression from the very beginning.

“She walked into our first practice as if she was always there,” he said.

She did not wait for someone to give her a place on the team.

“She made her presence felt,” Wilson said.

He remembered a young woman who arrived with determination and hope.

“When Dahphaney came on board, she came onboard with fire. She came onboard with a big hope.”

For Wilson, Dahphaney’s life reflected the light she carried.

“Dahphaney let her light shine. She did not hide it under a bushel.”

For Nickara Pratt, director of Housing and Resident Life at UB, her memories of Dahphaney began on move-in day in October 2023.

She described her as bright-eyed and full of energy.

“From the first day, we knew something was special about her,” Pratt said.

They saw leadership in her.

Dahphaney had come to Nassau from Abaco to pursue her education, but the university residence became home.

“It was where she laughed, where she danced, where she prayed.”

And where she encouraged other students who felt overwhelmed or intimidated by university life to keep going.

“She was a go-getter,” Pratt said.

If Dahphaney wanted something, she pursued it.

“She was not lazy. She worked.”

She seemed to always have a job while balancing her studies, responsibilities and life as a student.

Pratt described her as “present, engaged and caring.”

They mourned the loss of someone who was still becoming.

“She was growing into the woman she was meant to be,” Pratt said.

“She came as a student and left as family.”

The words spoken about a 42-year-old man killed are strikingly similar—“nice, quiet, respectful, humble, peaceful and trustworthy.”

Friends, schoolmates and people who grew up around Renaldo Curry are remembering the same kind of person — someone who did not look for trouble, treated people with respect and was known for simply being good to those around him.

Tameka Louis Jean remembered Curry as a schoolmate she had known from primary school through high school.

“My schoolmate was ever a nice person from I knew him from Primary School straight to High School,” she wrote in a social media post.

Racquel Nairn described him as a “nice quiet person” who did not get into trouble and was “very respectful.”

And for his sister, the loss is made even more painful by the life she says he was building.

“He was the nicest person in the world. He loved his two boys.”

Curry was one of two people shot Wednesday on John Road, off Mackey Street, according to reports. He was among a group of men when two gunmen on a scooter reportedly opened fire. Curry died at the scene, while the other victim was taken to hospital.

But for those mourning him, the circumstances of his death are not how they want his life remembered.

Latanya Minns remembered Curry from growing up in John Street, where he often spent time with her older brother.

“He always wore a smile and was always decent and respectful towards me,” she said, remembering him as “one of the sweetest, kindest, most humble young men ever.”

For her, Curry was someone who stepped into the role of a big brother when hers was not around; someone she remembers as protective and dependable.

“I am so sad this happened to him.”

Others echoed that sense of disbelief.

Daron Taylor called Curry “one of the most coolest dudes ever” and “very humble.”

Another friend simply wrote, “Humble person.”

Sonia Minns struggled to make sense of the loss. “Boy Curry, I still can’t believe this. You didn’t deserve this.”

Taricka Mackey mourned the death of a schoolmate and friend, remembering him as someone who was never troublesome.

And Jack Kidd described him as someone who “don’t bother,” a great and trustworthy person.

Perhaps one of the most painful reflections came from Don Rolle, who said he had known Curry all his life.

“Bro was so humble and peaceful.”

Rolle also spoke about the environment in which Curry grew up — the reality of being surrounded by people and circumstances that can bring danger close, even when it is not something a person seeks for themselves.

His death has left them asking for justice.

When Deshawn Newbold heard his name called as the 2026 Headboy of C.W. Sawyer Primary School, he was following in the footsteps of his two older brothers.

And somewhere in that moment, a family legacy came full circle. Deshawn’s older brother, Dominique Jr, known as DJ, was Headboy in 2019. His second brother, Devin, followed in 2022.

Now, Deshawn has completed an extraordinary three-for-three achievement that his parents, Rantica and Dominique Newbold, never imagined when their boys first walked through the school’s doors.

For Rantica, the moment was overwhelming.

“I was overjoyed. It was exciting,” she said. “All I could think was, ‘He did it, he did it, he did it.’”

She knew how much Deshawn wanted the position and she knew the example his brothers had already set.

“His older two brothers had set the bar high.”

The pressure was real, but so was the preparation.

Deshawn’s father said the family’s approach was simple, ‘Put in the work and trust God with the outcome.

“I knew he wanted it. He had put in the work,” Dominique said.

His brothers helped prepare him too, randomly throwing interview questions at him throughout the week and cheering him on as he worked toward the ceremony.

Devin even told his teacher he would be late because he was determined to be there when his little brother was crowned.

When Deshawn received the title, his brothers were among the first to celebrate him.

They hugged him and told him, “You did it. You did it.”

For the Newbolds, the achievement was never about competition between the brothers. Their rivalry is playful—arguments over trophies, grades and accomplishments, but underneath it is genuine support.

“They want each other to do well,” Dominique said.

In fact, Devin’s success had helped Deshawn believe the goal was possible.

“It made him realise it was in reach and is possible,” his father said.

After two brothers had done it, Dominique remembers thinking: “We two for two. We can go three for three.”

The family had already seen Deshawn’s potential from kindergarten. “He loved to work,” Dominique said. “He was not a lazy child.”

And watching all three boys excel at C.W. Sawyer carried another layer of meaning for their father, who attended the school himself.

His first-grade teacher even went on to teach one of his sons.

“I have always seen the leadership skills in each of them,” he said. “But the reality of actually watching it happen was breathtaking.”

Yet the Newbolds believe the boys’ greatest achievement is not a title. At home, they are taught to remain humble, show respect, use good manners and help others whenever they can.

And as a Christian family, they are reminded that their abilities and opportunities are gifts from God, but that hard work still matters.

Rantica said she feels especially blessed because her sons are not only intelligent, but respectful and responsible.

“To have three of them excelling and with good mannerisms was just amazing,” she said.

Perhaps the most powerful reminder of what the family has built came away from the school grounds. When Dominique’s father died last year, grief overwhelmed him. His sons saw their father cry and came to comfort him.

In that vulnerable moment, he saw something beyond academic achievement or leadership titles. He saw three young men who understood that their father needed them.

“That is a moment that I would never forget as long as I live,” he said.

The Bahamas is now challenging how US undercover agents operated here — just months before Jonathan “Player” Gardiner goes to trial in New York

The timing is hard to ignore.

For months, the Jonathan “Player” Gardiner case has been unfolding in US courts, exposing allegations of cocaine trafficking, Bahamian political connections and an undercover DEA operation that reportedly reached inside Parliament.

Now, the Davis administration is taking issue with how that investigation was conducted on Bahamian soil.

So the obvious question why now?

The Bahamas has long cooperated with US authorities in the fight against drug trafficking. OPBAT, the joint Bahamas-Turks and Caicos-US counter-narcotics framework, has been operating for more than four decades. The existence of that cooperation is not disputed.

But the Gardiner investigation appears to have crossed into a different and more sensitive territory.

US court filings allege that undercover DEA operatives and cooperating sources operated in the Bahamas during a years-long investigation. One affidavit alleges that a cooperating source, accompanied by another man, met an unnamed Bahamian politician inside Parliament in October 2024 to discuss a proposed cocaine shipment.

That politician — “Politician-1” — remains publicly unidentified.

The allegations became even more politically explosive after Gardiner was arrested following the May 12 plane crash and the US filings brought his alleged political connections into public view.

But the Bahamas did not suddenly discover the issue this week.

The Davis administration had already sought information from Washington about “Politician-1,” while Bahamian authorities began examining the allegations.

What is new is the escalation.

On September 18, Bahamas Ambassador to the US Wendall Jones led a delegation to the US Justice Department that included RBPF Assistant Commissioner Dwight Adderley and National Intelligence Agency Director Anthony Ferguson. The meeting was about matters the Bahamian side considered troubling concerning US operations in the Bahamas.

Now Jones says the complaint is that DEA agents operated without the required Bahamian permission, according to the Tribune.

US Ambassador Herschel Walker has fired back, calling the accusation “fake news” and pointing to the countries’ longstanding counter-drug cooperation.

And the timing is significant because Gardiner has now elected to stand trial with his co-defendants on March 1, 2027. His defence is seeking additional time to review discovery and prepare pretrial motions.

It raises a legitimate question: Could the dispute over how the DEA operated become part of the wider legal and political fallout from the Gardiner case?

That is the part worth watching.

What did Gardiner and the other defendants allegedly do? And were US investigators operating within the legal and diplomatic framework governing foreign law-enforcement activity in The Bahamas?

The first question belongs to the US courts and the second is now becoming a diplomatic dispute between two countries that have spent decades cooperating against the same threat.

And Wendall Jones is sitting directly in the middle of it as the Bahamian diplomat carrying the government’s concerns to Washington, alongside the country’s senior intelligence and police officials.

The Bahamas is now saying that cooperation has rules while Washington is saying, don’t confuse cooperation against traffickers with wrongdoing by the investigators.

With a March trial approaching and “Politician-1” still unidentified, why is the fight over the DEA’s methods becoming a problem now?

Jillian Pinder’s stepdaughter speaks of grief, anger, relief and a family changed forever

“My dad was sent to prison today.”

For Jillian Pinder’s stepdaughter, those words marked the beginning of another kind of grief— losing her stepmother and the father she thought she knew.

In a deeply personal social media post following her father’s remand to prison, she described being overwhelmed by emotions she was still struggling to understand.

“I’m sad. I’m angry. I’m hurt,” she wrote.

“And honestly, there is also a part of me that feels a sense of relief.”

It’s the complicated reality that can follow a tragedy when the people involved are not strangers, but family.

Jillian Pinder, a 56-year-old teacher at TG Glover Primary School, died on July 13, weeks after she was attacked and stabbed in the neck on June 4.

Her husband, George Pinder, has been charged in connection with her death, alongside another man. He faces murder, conspiracy to murder and abetment to murder charges.

For Jillian’s stepdaughter, however, the court proceedings are only one part of what she is now carrying.

“I’m grieving more than one thing,” she wrote. “I’m grieving my stepmother, whose life was taken. I’m grieving the family we were supposed to be.”

She said things she had heard her father say about his children and his wife had caused deep pain.

“Words can leave wounds that people cannot always see,” she wrote in a social media post.

But she also made a deliberate choice not to allow anger to consume her.

Instead, she said she wants to acknowledge her pain, protect her heart and give herself permission to feel whatever comes.

There is, she wrote, no single correct way to respond to a tragedy like this.

“I don’t have to choose between being sad and being relieved. I can mourn my stepmother while also mourning the parts of my own life that have been changed forever.”

Her words also turned toward the people she is determined to protect, her family, her daughter and, especially, her siblings.

“My whole heart goes out to my stepmother, to her loved ones, and to everyone whose life has been changed by this tragedy,” she wrote.

“Right now, I’m choosing peace.”

She said she is choosing to let the truth come to light while giving herself permission to heal.

She may never understand why things happened the way they did, she wrote, but she knows she deserves the space to grieve, to process it, and eventually find peace.

“I did not cause this. I cannot change the past. And I do not have to carry all of this alone.”

“I always think about Miss Pinder. She was so beautiful. She was such a sweet teacher.”

For those who knew Jillian Pinder, 56, they remember her laugh, jokes and kindness. The teacher who poured into her students, the aunt who called for advice, the mother whose children were at the centre of her life.

And, perhaps most strikingly, family remember her faith.

Pinder, a teacher at TG Glover Primary School, died on July 13, weeks after she was attacked and stabbed in the neck on June 4.

Her husband, George Pinder, and another man have since been charged in connection with her death. They face murder and conspiracy charges, with George Pinder also facing a charge of abetment to murder. The allegations are waiting to be proven in court.

But as the legal process begins, Jillian’s family is determined that the woman she was should not disappear behind the case.

Her niece, Janine Capron, remembered a woman whose relationship with her family was filled with laughter.

“Our calls were always some joke or story. She loved to laugh!” Capron wrote.

Jillian was often the first person to send birthday and anniversary messages. She showed up for family milestones and, when difficult conversations were necessary, she remained family.

“She was always the first message for birthdays or anniversaries. She showed up for every family event and milestone,” Capron wrote.

Then came the phone call that changed everything.

Capron recalled rushing to Nassau after learning Jillian had been attacked. When she entered her aunt’s ICU room, she broke down in tears.

But Jillian comforted her. “I am still here,” she told her.

Capron said Jillian recounted what had happened and repeatedly expressed that she simply wanted her life.

“He can have it all, I just want my life,” Capron recalled her saying.

And there was something Jillian reportedly told her attackers. “I forgive you.”

Her niece said those words have stayed with her.

“I haven’t gotten to that place yet,” she wrote.

For a family still struggling to understand the loss, forgiveness is not simple, neither is grief.

Jillian’s family has created the Justice for Jill Facebook page as they seek answers and support for her children.

“As we continue to remember and fight for Jill, we ask that you please keep her beautiful children lifted in prayer,” the family said.

Her niece Anna Capron wrote that the family trusted God even when they could not understand the delays.

“We may not be able to bring her back, but we can make sure she is never forgotten,” she wrote.

That may be the family’s greatest act of remembrance.

After praying at a memorial for his schoolmate, R.M. Bailey student Cameron Strachan is using his own journey to encourage young Bahamians to hold on to faith, education and purpose.

When Cameron Strachan stood before his schoolmates at the memorial service for his schoolmate, Anton Bowe, he was praying from a place of knowing what it means to go through a difficult season.

The 11th-grade R.M. Bailey Senior High School student delivered a heartfelt prayer that moved students, teachers and administrators.

But behind that powerful moment is a young man who says he has faced some of the hardest years of his life.

While attending A.F. Adderley Junior High School, Cameron says he struggled with his mental health— a period he describes simply as “the hardest years of my life.”

His academic performance suffered. Yet somehow, he kept serving.

He was eventually appointed Head Boy.

“For me, it was only by the grace of God,” Cameron said.

Today, he wants to use what he has learned to encourage other young people who may be quietly fighting battles of their own.

Cameron’s faith began taking shape at an early age in his Nassau Village home, where he was raised by his mother alongside his younger sister.

His mother taught them Psalm 91 and made sure they recited it repeatedly.

“Until we lived by it, until we lived in it,” Cameron recalled.

That foundation has remained with him.

And when tragedy struck his school community, Cameron felt compelled to stand before his peers and pray.

For him, school should be more than a place where young people receive an education. It should also be a place where they can find encouragement, support and a sense of safety.

“I believe that this campus is where students are going to be set free and delivered from whatever they are going through,” he said.

Cameron now hopes to become Head Boy of R.M. Bailey next academic year. But he believes leadership is about being someone another young person can approach when life becomes difficult.

His philosophy is simple: “It’s good to be book smart and Bible smart.”

His ambition is to become a police officer and eventually study law and theology, combining his desire to serve others with his Christian faith.

Adapted from Ministry of Education Bahamas