More from Peter Swanson, via Loose Cannon
Lease Reveals a Tangled Web of Nassau Influence Behind $2.5 Million Project
PETER SWANSON
FEB 23, 2025
The government minister for the Exuma Cays has ordered a halt to the installation of moorings in a $2.5 million lease deal between the Bahamas and a politically powerful group of Nassau insiders. Signed January 23, the lease extends for 21 years and is renewable.
“You are hereby ordered to cease and desist all mooring installations and related activities immediately until official approval has been obtained from the Department of Environmental Planning and Protection, the Port Department, the Exuma Cays District Council and any other relevant agencies. Failure to comply may result in further action being taken,” wrote Administrator Christopher Adderly in the February 21 order.
The order was addressed to Philip A. Kemp II, one half of a Nassau power couple who is listed as president of the Bahamas Moorings Ltd. Bahamas Moorings is leaseholder for 4,165 acres of seabed. The lease granted to Bahamas Moorings stipulates installation of 250 moorings in 49 locations throughout the Exumas archipelago.
The moorings project came as a complete surprise to its potential customer base, American cruisers, as well as Bahamians living on the cays where the moorings are being installed.
Pieced from public record, with help of knowlegeable sources, there emerges a tangled web of influence behind Bahamas Moorings.
Philip Kemp’s wife is Sandra H. Kemp, who also happens to be a principal in the company and a signatory witnessing the Bahamas Moorings lease deal. Sandra Kemp is deputy director of communications in the office of Bahamas Prime Minister Philip Davis.
Raymond C. Knowles is the third person signing the lease as a Bahamas Moorings principal. Going under his middle name, Christian Knowles is a captain for the Pieces of 8 Tours, an excursion company of Nassau.
Pieces of 8 is reportedly owned by Jerome Fitzgerald, whose son, Edward, also works there as a captain alongside Knowles.
Jerome Fitzgerald is a controversial Bahamian politician who served as a senator, a member of the Parliament and finally as minister of Education, Science & Technology from 2012 to 2017. Fitzgerald, who is reportedly a political ally of the Kemps, became a special advisor to Prime Minister Philip Davis after his election in 2021, according to Wikipedia.
In an April 20, 2017 story in the Tribune newspaper of Nassau showed Fitzgerald seemingly engaging in a shakedown:
EMAILS leaked from a data breach of China Construction America’s (CCA) servers show that from as early as 2013, Jerome Fitzgerald was seeking to secure millions of dollars in brokerage, trucking, and limousine contracts at Baha Mar while he sat in Cabinet as the Minister of Education, Science and Technology, The Tribune has learned. The emails contradict the Minister, who this week denied ever using his office to direct contracts to himself or his family from the multi-billion dollar resort. Mr. Fitzgerald—the Progressive Liberal Party MP for Marathon—appears also to be requesting $20,000 a month from Baha Mar’s original developer Sarkis Izmirlian, citing the expenses that were necessary to cover the cost of his father’s medical treatment.
The role of CCA in the development of the $3.5 billion Baha Mar resort in Nassau was a controversy in its own right. Fitzgerald admitted seeking assistance from the CCA executive but added, “Nothing came of it and that remains the case today.”
So far nothing in the record indicates where the money for the $2.5 million project is coming from. According to the lease, rent for the mooring field is 3 percent of annual gross revenue plus value added tax, payable in advance to the Bahamas Land & Surveys Office.
