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Save The Bays Gazette
Friday, April 19th, 2013
Save The Bays Gazette | Volume 2 | www.protectcliftonbay.org
Letters
to the Editor
Mr Louis Bacon is a director
of the Coalition to Protect
Clifton Bay. He has asked
our Gazette to publish a
letter which he has shared
with his fellow directors.
Dear Colleagues
First, I wish to say congratulations for helping the Coalition
launch so successfully. I am
confident that we are going
to accomplish significant and
sustainable results.
The Coalition’s
Work and
Objectives
I am aware that an issue is being raised in the press by the
Coalition’s detractors to confuse and marginalize our efforts.
It is said that our Coalition is
“Bacon’s Coalition” and is being used as an instrument in
my “feud” with Peter Nygard.
The objectives and work of the
Coalition are not about me
and Peter.
They concern matters that
affect us all, both future generations of Bahamians and
persons who visit this country to enjoy one of the most
beautiful natural settings in
the world.
For those of you who are interested, and in case you are
asked questions about the socalled “Nygard/Bacon” feud, I
would like to explain my position.
Protection of the
environment is my
passion
Clifton Bay is a
place I call home
By way of background, I consider myself an environmental
philanthropist and am grateful
I am able to support worthy
environmental causes. I have
done so through the Moore
Charitable Foundation which
I founded and named in honor of my mother. Please do
look it up on the internet and
see what it is about.
In keeping with my passion for
the environment, I am proud
to be a founding member of
the Coalition to Protect Clifton Bay and, along with others
who believe in our cause, am
committed to help funding its
development. This endeavor
is worthy for the potential
it has to battle the myriad
threats to the Western New
Providence environment and
economy as well as those faced
by The Bahamas as a whole.
In addition to my love for the
Bahamian environment, my
family and I have a special
place in our hearts for our
home at Clifton Bay. My wife
and I were married by Reverend Cartwright of Lyford’s St
Christopher’s Church on the
property and he also baptized
my children in the same spot
overlooking the beautiful waters of Clifton. My children
went to Lyford Cay School
and my wife and I embraced
the friendships we were cultivating until Peter Nygard
began his campaign against
me (which I describe below),
resulting in us deciding to
school our children in the
States. Despite the campaign,
we still cherish our time at
Clifton.
I am committed to protecting
our home and its beautiful environment. As my friend and
mentor, Bobby Kennedy says,
‘environmentalism starts in
your back yard’.
Along with many families in
the Bahamas, Clifton Bay and
Western New Providence are
our ‘back yard’ – and, as such,
cannot be ignored.
My role in the
Clifton Heritage Site
success story
Also by way of background,
much has been said about
my involvement in the earlier
campaign to save what is now
called the “The Clifton Heritage Site”.
Here are the facts –
I became a part of that campaign some 14 years ago in
an effort to protect the undeveloped Whylly Plantation on
Clifton from foreign development.
While many local leaders effectively rallied their constituents to fight the Government
for control over the remaining
available public beach front
and coastline for Nassuvians
to enjoy, we marshaled and
supported the international
forces that helped take the
fight directly to the developer
and their financiers.
This was an important fight
for Nassuvians to win given
the explosion in development
and growth that was making
it more difficult for the Bahamian public to have access to
beaches and coastline recreation areas. The Clifton battle
was also fundamentally important to preserve some of
the last remaining Lucayan
Indian, Loyalist, Plantation
and Slave era archeological
sites heritage. (For those of
you who may not have recently taken a tour, I recommend
visiting the Clifton Heritage
Site to experience it firsthand.)
We also introduced renowned
international
non-governmental organizations to the
campaign and brought in recognized speakers and environmental leaders as well as international press to support the
Bahamian Coalition. Working with local advocate Sam
Duncombe, in 2002 we successfully applied to have the
Clifton Heritage Site listed as
one of the World Monument’s
Watch List of 100 most Endangered Sites thereby bringing international attention
to what had, until then, been
perceived as a small grassroots
battle on one part of one island in a small country.
Through various methods of
advocacy and education in the
United States, we eventually
persuaded the financiers of
the proposed gated development - the Bechtel Corporation- to drop out of funding
the project. Concurrently we
helped fund local leaders and
Friday, April 19th, 2013 | PAGE 1
Louis Bacon
Tells His Story
LOUIS BACON
• continued from page 1
TELLS HIS STORY
organizations in their successful efforts to take the campaign to the Bahamian people.
Also in the United States,
through our state-side environmental partners, a US
Freedom of Information Act
(FOIA) request was filed. As
a result, an important unpublished Bahamian archeological study by a US-based firm
was released. We discovered
that this study, which was apparently being withheld from
the Bahamian people by their
own government, revealed the
precious and unique Lucayan
ruins, as well as Plantation and
Slave sites and dwellings that
stood to be destroyed by the
offshore developers.
Once the study was released
in the US, the Bahamian authorities reluctantly made it
available to others and Keod
Smith (now my main critic)
publicized it to good effect
in the Bahamian Parliament.
This public revelation of what
the archeologists Wilkie and
Farnsworth deemed “one of
the Bahamas’ priceless historic
resources and best-preserved
Loyalist plantation site on
New Providence” was one of
many key events that elevated
this campaign in the eyes of
the public, here and abroad,
and damned the idea of development being in the interests
of The Bahamas.
In addition, to prevent the
Clifton Heritage Site from being sold to the intended foreign developers, in the spring
of 2000 I made an offer to the
previous Ingraham FNM administration to pay up to $15
Million dollars to buy the 208
acre property from the owners
of Clifton and then transfer
ownership to the Bahamian
government to be used as a
National Park forever.
Keod has now raised this issue, claiming I am trying to
buy the site for myself and am
using the Coalition to carry
out this secret agenda. Let me
be very clear: I do not want
to acquire, secretly or openly,
any part of the Clifton Heritage site. To sell me or any individual Crown Land from
the Clifton Heritage Site is as
ludicrous a proposition as the
idea of the Government selling or leasing Crown Land at
Simms Point to Keod’s main
client, Peter Nygard.
I also approached the sellers with a similar proposal to
purchase the land, but as our
efforts mounted, so did the
sellers’ asking price. They saw
what a valuable commodity
their land had become to the
national pride of The Bahamas
as well as to the developers.
The sellers’ asking price ratcheted up from $15 Million Dollars to $40 Million Dollars and
then to $50 Million Dollars.
From 1999 – 2005, while the
fate of the land was in limbo,
we continued to work to protect the Clifton site by fund-
ing EDAW (an internationally recognized public land
planning firm specializing in
the responsible and sustainable development of sensitive
lands, national parks and open
space), in its development of
different plans for the form
a National Park could take,
based on alternative funding
scenarios.
In 2006, once the PLP/Christie administration honored
its pledge to acquire and preserve the Clifton Heritage Site
for the Bahamian people, our
EDAW work product, which
cost approximately $200,000,
was donated to the Bahamian government. Much of
the EDAW recommendations
became the template for the
Clifton Heritage Authority land planning. Given that
Mr. Christie came through for
The Bahamas with the Clifton
Heritage Site, I am confident
that he will be supportive of
the goals in the Coalition’s Petition.
I have never claimed
sole responsibility
for the campaign
to save the Clifton
Heritage Site
I have never claimed sole responsibility for the campaign
to Save Clifton – far, far from
it.
What I said on the subject of
who was responsible for the
original Save Clifton campaign, when accepting the
Audubon Award for achievements in environmentalism
and conservation, has been
twisted by Keod Smith. I was
talking about lessons I have
learnt from environmental
campaigns, the first of which
was to not be afraid to be a
NIMBY (Not in My Backyard)
in the fight for your environmental rights, as I am doing
today.
What I actually said in Lesson
Number Two was to:
“Lead, but from behind. It
may sound counterintuitive, but sometimes we are
most effective when we quietly provide support and
direction to those that have
the most to lose, those who
have been in the local community the longest, who
count on the land for their
livelihood, their health,
their sanity.
When we went and fought
developers in Clifton Bay,
we came in as white, foreign
outsiders in a proud, native
Bahamian culture, and we
won because of the powerful
alliances we forged…with
the community leaders who
actually ending up leading
the fight – personified by
a young environmentalist
leader, who was running
for office, Perry Christie,
who listened to Bobby Kennedy on the radio as he was
driving to his campaign
and Bobby was exhorting
the Bahamians to make sure
that they safeguarded this
one last outlet the public
had to the water around the
island of Nassau. And Perry
Christie used that as his
main campaign theme. And
he rode the wave of public
anger and declared: “If I am
elected Prime Minister that
development on Clifton, if
it is done, will not stand.
Now, Prime Minister Christie, was true to his word, as
you heard on the video, has
turned Clifton’s Heritage
Park into Nassau’s only National Park. The developers
are long gone.
Thank you, Bobby.
He
gave me a lot of credit, but,
frankly, he (meaning Christie) sealed the deal.”
The full text is publically available if anyone wants to check
the facts.
The invitation to reengage in The Bahamian environmental
conservation movement
When present Prime Minister Christie generously
praised my help in the Clifton
fight, and the Audubon Society awarded me their highest
honour for my environmental
contributions in the United
States and abroad (a humbling
moment), Keod Smith declared that I had been unduly
recognized.
Keod challenged me publicly
to come back and get re-involved in Bahamian conservation efforts, if indeed I had
been important in the original
Coalition’s success, which he
professed to doubt.
In fact before his invitation, I
had re-engaged by participating in our new Coalition to
Protect Clifton Bay.
It seems odd that Keod would
complain about my decision
to become fully re-engaged
in the fight to protect the environment in The Bahamas.
No doubt he has belatedly realized that any environmental
effort which seeks to clean and
protect the waters of Clifton
Bay, as well as pushing for an
Environmental Protection Act
and a Freedom of Information
Act, negatively affects his client, Peter Nygard.
Peter Nygard’s theft
of Crown Land…
Exposed
Peter Nygard has long worried
that his illegal appropriation
of Crown Land, which appears to have been going on
for the last 20 years, would be
exposed as an injury to the Bahamian people.
For the last few years, Peter
has tried to wage a campaign
to deflect attention from this
issue. He has sought to make
Save The Bays Gazette | Volume 2 | www.protectcliftonbay.org
a federal case out of issues
concerning his use of a right
of way over my land (which he
has a legal right to use to access his property).
The fact is, in 2010 the Bahamas Government issued
a directive that Peter return
Nygard Cay Crown Land to
its natural state. In a letter
dated 21st July 2010 and sent
by Mr David Davis, Permanent Secretary in the Office of
The Prime Minister to Peter
Nygard, it was stated “Over the years the property
originally purchased by you
has expanded significantly
as shown on the enclosed
photo map. This accretion
of land has resulted from
the strategic placement of
groynes and docks at Simms
Point. Over the years you
have also built structures on
and otherwise used accreted
land that farmed over the
seabed. It is noted that your
attorney in a letter dated
8th January 2009 applied on
your behalf for a lease of the
pink areas shown on the enclosed photo map.
I am directed to advise
that the Government is not
minded to approve a lease
of the accreted land and request that you remove any
structures that would have
been created on this land
over the years.
It would be appreciated if
you would cause the coastline at Simms Point, Lyford
Cay, to be reinstated according to the enclosed photo
map.”
Peter Nygard’s litany
of lawsuits and
personal attacks on
my family and home
began
The day after Peter received
The Bahamas government letter, he commenced a series of
attacks against me in the full
glare of the media.
Road right-of-way
action
First, on July 22nd, 2010 he
sued over changes I had made
four years earlier to the roadway between our houses (despite having congratulated me
at the time on the improvements). Full press attention
was given to this issue, as if it
was of national concern. It has
been the basis of a number of
legal skirmishes that are ongoing today.
Police anti-terrorist
squad raid on our
home
Five days later, on July 26th,
our home
• continued on page 2
was subject to a three hour
invasion by 11 armed nonuniformed detectives from the
terrorist squad with no warrant. Peter had complained
to the police that my outdoor
speakers were targeting jet aircraft to explode out of the sky.
I explain more about this incident and the detectives’ humiliation and coercion of my
employees and intimidation
over my children, below.
Civil Conspiracy
Action
In April 2010, the Canadian
Broadcasting
Corporation
broadcast a penetrating documentary about Peter entitled
‘Larger than Life’. Once the
backlash against him about the
raid in the community subsided, in April 2011 Peter sued
me and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
After ensuring the defamatory contents of the pleadings
in support of the action were
widely publicized, Peter took
no steps to advance the claim.
The only purpose seems to
have been to try to denigrate
my reputation.
Private criminal conspiracy prosecution
On the 12th of April, 2012 he
launched a private criminal
conspiracy prosecution - a
rarely used arcane maneuver
- against me and my property
lawyer, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and an officer at the Lyford Cay Property Owners Association - which
was swiftly discontinued by
the Attorney-General.
Second Civil Conspiracy Claim
On 13th April 2012 Peter commenced another civil conspiracy claim against me, this time
adding the Attorney General
and the Minister of the Environment for greater effect.
Having achieved his desired
press exposure and once I filed
documents showing I planned
to defend the claim, he withdrew the action on June 25th.
Physical action taken against our home
Following the General Election
of May 2012, Peter seemed to
become emboldened, possibly
because of his claims to have
bankrolled the PLP.
His employees began erecting
“Nygard Cay” signs on my
roadway while ripping down
my own, placing boulders in
our parking area and destroying speed bumps that are common on Lyford roadways to
increase safety. At a hearing
on 13 June 2012, undertakings
were given by the parties to
the Court to preserve the status quo regarding the roadway
(i.e. that neither party alter,
amend or build on the road).
Peter breached his undertaking to the Supreme Court; for
example, he laid a new surface
over the roadway and had his
staff cut down the security
gates. Consequently on 8 October 2012 the court ruled that
Peter was in contempt of court
and the Judge ordered him
to pay $50,000 to the Public
Treasury and reimburse me
for the costs of reversing his
changes to the roadway or go
to prison. Peter is currently appealing the decision.
Another
private
criminal conspiracy
claim
On June 7 2012, Nygard commenced a second private criminal prosecution claim against
me,. After the inevitable damaging publicity, Nygard withdrew this action on June 25th
at the same time as withdrawing the second civil conspiracy
claim.
Nygard’s
actions
against The Government
Along the way, Nygard filed a
judicial review claim against
The Bahamian government
over its decision for him to
address his taking of Crown
Lands. He then withdrew the
claim and brought a civil suit
seeking a declaration he owns
the Crown Land he claims has
accreted naturally.
These cases, which do not involve me, are the only ones
relating to Nygard’s illegal appropriation of Crown Land.
His suits against me all relate
to his reputation and use of my
roadway; they have nothing to
do with his aggrandizement of
Crown Land.
Nygard’s modus operandi
seems to be to use his considerable financial resources to
bring as many suits as possible,
knowing damaging allegations
within them will be picked up
by the press. He does this even
if the cases have no merit and
is willing to abandon them
shortly after they receive media attention. Inevitably, this
approach inhibits people and
newspapers - whose role it is
to hold truth to power - from
speaking out against him. For
instance, he launched no less
than five law suits against the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation over its documentary
mentioned above (tellingly, his
defamation claim only related
to 83 seconds of the 42 minute
program).
Faced with such aggression, it
is understandable why those
with less wherewithal to defend themselves are fearful of
challenging Peter. As Forbes
magazine wrote in its damning exposé, “He Answers to
No One” and certainly not to
anyone in The Bahamas.
The Social Media Attacks Are Launched
From August 2010, the month
after the Ingraham administration ordered Peter to return
the Simms Point to its natural
state and onwards until today,
a cottage industry blossomed
to unbelievable proportions
in the Bahamian online blogosphere and in elusive local rag
sheets, spreading malicious
falsehoods about me and promoting this so-called “Nygard/
Bacon feud”; as being of some
national or even international
importance.
Unfortunately, in the eyes of
many international clients to
whom I have had to explain
the Bahamian-based attacks
on the internet and in the
press, particularly in relation
to the bogus allegation that the
police were compelled to take
action against me, the reputation of the Bahamas as a civil
society has been besmirched
in the offshore banking world
as a direct result of Nygard’s
smear campaign.
As you can imagine, the smear
campaign being engineered
from The Bahamas against me
is also receiving attention in
the financial services industry
around the world. Sadly, it has
harmed the reputation of The
Bahamas as a place to conduct business, at a time when
it could be capitalizing on the
pressures faced by European
financial centers to grow business volumes and create employment opportunities for
residents. Instead of The Bahamas looking like a refuge in
the financial storm, it comes
across as having its own corrosive tempest, deterring cautious international investors.
Financial ramifications of Nygard’s
smear-campaign
Our firm had requested some
15 years ago that our fund
Administrator, CITCO, the
world’s largest international
funds administrator, open a
branch in Nassau from their
base in Caribbean Curacao in
order to bring my business to
the Bahamian banking sector. The business would be
closer to my home, the people I wanted to support and
to Nassau where my business
normally held its annual Directors’ meeting.
Two years ago, as the attacks
continued and became more
publicized, my main clients
and senior managers urged
me to reconsider The Bahamas in my company’s fiduciary
role with the funds I manage.
The security and safety of client records and sanctity of the
registrar list as well as fund
accounting is a sacrosanct obligation in fund administration and, as I was under attack
from various unscrupulous
and powerful antagonists from
The Bahamas, it was the prudent thing to move on quietly
rather than risk the funds being jeopardized. In winding
down CITCO’s fund accounting, administration and share
registrar activity for us - their
anchor client - the office unfortunately had to retire almost all of their highly trained
employees, causing the office
to shrink from 65 financial
Bahamian employees to only a
dozen today.
This action pained me at the
time and it pains me now to
have to reveal it as it is not a
fair reflection of the Bahamian
financial industry, which has
suffered as an innocent bystander.
True reason for the
so-called “feud”
I could never understand until recently why Peter continued to instigate such a relentless, high publicity legal
battle which had only seemed
to lower his standing and image. I am a private person
and my only desire is for my
family and I to come down
to your beautiful country to
relax, snorkel and fish - not
engage in lawsuits and PR.
Friday, April 19th, 2013 | PAGE 2
Heretofore, my issue with Peter concerned his being a bad
neighbor, whether because of
his all night blaring music or
his parking or building on my
roadway – issues that would
not make the morning newspapers and that the Bahamian
Court system is fully capable
of dealing with.
But Peter’s success in conflating a neighbor’s “tiff ” with his
larger issues has meant he has
been able to successfully create a smoke-screen, distracting
the public and Government
officials from his illegal and
destructive development activities.
Protecting My Reputation
I have been forced in order to
defend my reputation to bring
defamation proceedings concerning allegations that I have
perpetrated such crimes as
murder, smuggling, arson and
corruption. These are currently working their way through
the court system. I am represented by Robert Adams of
Graham Thompson and Co.
and not Fred Smith QC of the
Coalition who does not act for
me.
In one of the defensive defamation suits I felt compelled
to lodge, Wendell Jones’ company admitted to publishing
false allegations about me in
The Bahamas Journal as part
of a smear campaign and implied that such publication was
encouraged and supported by
Peter Nygard.
The Police Raid of
My Home
The police’s terrorist raid of
my home was a seriously low
ebb in my wife’s and my commitment to The Bahamas. The
11 armed officers ransacked
our home whilst treating our
Bahamian employees as criminals, handcuffed together for
over 3 hours. And this was all
done whilst the press waited
outside.
The police also made a point
of photographing all the doors
and entry ways to our home.
More worryingly still, in front
of bound employees, the officer in charge took digital photographs of my three young children’s (one of them a toddler)
bedrooms and individually of
each of their framed portraits;
photos of their smiling faces.
We were extremely concerned
about these photos being forwarded to some pedophile
ring – otherwise what was
their legitimate purpose?
On the way out, as they released and unbound those employees that had been kept in
our open garage, the police finally asked what the “big boxes” were. My speakers had long
since been dismantled and put
in the garage (not positioned
as “supersonic weapons to
blast jets out of the sky”) when
Peter had first complained to
the police about them. The police had not asked about them
once, but they remembered
the pretense under which they
had forced entrance and left
with them in tow. The raid had
nothing to do with speakers. It
was all about extreme intimidation
When the officer’s supervisory
staff realized what a colossal
blunder this bogus raid by its
rogue policeman had been,
they had the speakers returned
within two hours.
Decision to leave The
Bahamas
As one of the sinister police’s
photographing was directed at
our child’s Lyford Cay School
Kindergarten Class photograph, we felt bound to alert
our child’s classmates’ parents
by e-mail that their children’s
pictures had been caught up in
this matter of child profiling,
lest their child be mistaken for
ours and harmed, either physically or by display on the internet via digital images.
Whether because of the raid
that upset the community Lyford Security said no raid
of this sort had ever occurred
there - or because the email
to affected children’s’ parents
went viral, or, because of a letter I was penning to my investors explaining why I was not
actually a criminal in Nassau’s
eyes and yet we felt forced into
leaving the Bahamas, Prime
Minister Ingraham’s office became involved and requested
for me not to pollute the nest
I was leaving with any accusatory missive.
He promised that his office
would personally secure the
police digital clip of my young
children, their kindergarten
class, as well as their bedroom
entrance and windows and return it to me.
The Commissioner of Police,
Mr Ellison Greenslade, also
visited with me. In the presence of an attorney, he apologized and promised that the
officer in charge would be severely reprimanded.
After my meeting with the
Commissioner of Police, as
promised, the digital film clip
was returned by the Prime
Minister’s office
The conciliatory interventions
of former Prime Minister Ingraham and Commissioner
Greenslade appeased matters
somewhat. Nonetheless we
were duly intimidated and felt
forced out.
At the time of the raid, my
neighbor Kris Lehmkuhl and
I had commissioned the rebuilding of the dilapidated
and dangerous Jaws Beach
Dock on Clifton Bay. Kris and
I had proposed the rebuild
project as a prelude to moving
our successful Learn to Swim
Program, which taught Bahamians to swim, from Freeport
to Nassau. The barge with material was standing off Clifton
Heritage Park ready to begin
work – dejected, I cancelled
the project and we put our
home up for sale.
The Bahamas is still
‘Home’ for me
I would have thought Peter
would be happy to have me
depart the property as I listed
it for sale. Yet he continued tying up the property with lawsuits, such that no one wanted
to purchase a property with
liens on it.
Without me to pillory and sue
in order to confuse public law
issues, through his emissary
Keod Smith, Peter’s aggrandizement, seizure and occupa-
tion of Bahamian Crown Land
would be the centerpiece issue
of a bald attack against the Bahamian people. The true story
would be told, namely Nygard
in open litigation and conflict
with the Government of The
Bahamas over his illegal usurpation of Crown Land.
Whether due to my having decided to stay on in my home
over time, thankful that the
judicial system gives respect to
the rule of law, the recognition
by Prime Minister Christie and
the Audubon Society of my efforts in the initial Clifton fight,
or because of Keod’s exhortations to prove my Bahamian
environmental credentials, I
am very happy to stay in the
beautiful Bahamas and do all I
can to support the Coalition to
Protect Clifton Bay.
I hope that this environmentally conscious Government
will commit itself to the simple
issue of Nygard’s illegal taking of Bahamian Crown land
and damage to the beaches at
Clifton.
I also hope the Government
does not give any credence to
Peter’s attempt to justify 20
years of Crown Land theft by
building a $50 million dollar
commercial stem cell spa and
research hospital within his
property. Obviously a venture
of that sort cannot be housed
in a residential property of that
size (even if Peter has made it
twice as big since he bought it).
Time to address the
real issues
Beyond Nygard Cay, there are
more taxing and complicated
issues at hand for the Coalition
- immediately, the oil issues
and fuel bunkering stations at
Clifton.
Dealing with the declining
conch and fisheries population
is critical for the future of the
Bahamas tourist industry.
The larger issues of a Bahamian Environmental Protection
Act and Freedom of Information Act are complex and need
full deliberation and debate.
These and other environmental issues are meaty and worthy of much debate, advocacy
and education. We all have to
contribute somehow to these
complicated environmental
solutions which will not be
as straightforward as dealing
with Nassau’s most blatant
scofflaw.
I am proud to be connected
with promoting the discussion
with a Coalition of leaders
that hopefully will help decide
what their great environmentally blessed country merits.
If there is any country where
the sea, the sand, the coral
and the fish are important to
the identity of the nation, it
is yours, and there needs to
be full and open discourse on
the issues that protect your
national heritage, just as happened 14 years ago in the original Clifton Coalition struggle.
I am honored to be a part of
the new Coalition to achieve
these goals.
Yours faithfully
Louis Bacon.