The Progressive Liberal Party (PLP)—masters of political illusion, where substance takes a backseat to spectacle and common sense is buried under a pile of press releases.

On July 11, the Hon. Dr. Michael Darville, Minister of Health and Wellness, boldly emerged from the echo chamber to defend his government’s decision to abandon the much-needed $90 million Princess Margaret Hospital (PMH) upgrade project in favor of borrowing a whopping $267 million from the People’s Republic of China to build a shiny new specialty hospital in western New Providence.

Yes, you read that right: $90 million in secured financing for PMH improvements—sent back. And why? Because apparently, fixing what’s broken doesn’t quite offer the razzle-dazzle of cutting the ribbon on a new hospital. In PLP logic, it’s always better to dig a new hole than fill the one you’re drowning in.

Dr. Darville claims “no construction had started” on the PMH upgrades—an eyebrow-raising assertion, considering renovations were clearly underway before the PLP swept in with a bulldozer and a blank check to Beijing. If this is what the PLP calls “starting fresh,” we dread to imagine what they do with half-finished meals.

And the loan terms? Well, we’re being told that the labor arrangement with the Chinese financiers is still being “negotiated”—but somehow, the PLP already paraded around a 50/50 split between Chinese and Bahamian workers like it’s a win. Because nothing screams “Bahamian empowerment” quite like outsourcing half the construction jobs to imported labor while local contractors twiddle their thumbs in the unemployment line.

Meanwhile, public hospitals in both New Providence and Grand Bahama remain understaffed, underfunded, and overburdened—but let’s not let that get in the way of a good press conference. After all, who needs functioning facilities when you can have artistic renderings of a specialty hospital that won’t be ready for years?

Dr. Darville—who has now traded his Pineridge constituency (rumored to have told him not to come back) for the more politically cozy Tall Pines—deflects criticism from former Minister of Health Dr. Duane Sands with classic PLP flair: “The FNM laid off workers!” As if that justifies abandoning a ready-to-go hospital upgrade plan for a debt-fueled fantasy.

Let’s connect the dots:

• ✅ $90 million secured by the FNM for PMH upgrades
• ❌ PLP sends the money back
• 💰 $267 million borrowed instead—mostly from China
• 🇨🇳 Up to 50% of construction jobs go to non-Bahamians
• 🏥 PMH still crumbling, Rand Memorial still coughing
• 📸 New hospital still years (and untold overruns) away

But don’t worry—the Davis administration assures us this is all part of a “strategic plan.” One might assume the strategy involves photo ops, padded contracts, and a splash of revisionist history.

The sad truth? This isn’t about improving healthcare. It’s about political legacy. It’s about being able to say, “We built a hospital,” even if in the process, we abandon the one Bahamians already depend on.

And who really benefits? The construction firms? Foreign lenders? Politicians chasing a monument to themselves? It certainly isn’t the nurses working double shifts in crumbling facilities or the patients waiting hours for treatment in overcrowded wards.

In the end, this move sums up the PLP’s ethos in a single tragic irony: they abandoned a hospital project that was already healing, just so they could build one from scratch—and call it progress.

You truly couldn’t make this nonsense up. But then again, with the PLP, you don’t have to.

The Bahamian people deserve better. But with the PLP, they rarely get it.

The Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) fails for one reason, it is their nature.

END