Dr. Duane Sands, chairman of the Bahamas’ Free National Movement (FNM) opposition party, has launched a scathing public rebuke against sitting Prime Minister Philip “Brave” Davis, alleging the head of government is operating as if he is exempt from basic public accountability for taxpayer funds, following Davis’s dismissive, offhand response to press inquiries about the total public cost of King Charles III’s first official royal visit to the Bahamas as reigning monarch. When approached by reporters to share the exact taxpayer expenditure for the high-profile royal trip, Davis brushed off the question with a flippant remark, stating he had no knowledge of the specific dollar figure and questioning why reporters would raise the topic, before visibly growing frustrated and walking away from the press pack entirely.
Sands, in a widely shared public voice note, argued that the prime minister’s reaction was part of a longstanding pattern of evading oversight, deriding Davis as “Emperor Philip” for what he described as a habit of feigning ignorance, lashing out at journalists, and resenting legitimate questions from both the opposition and ordinary Bahamian citizens about public spending. The FNM chairman drew a direct contrast with transparency norms in the United Kingdom, noting that both the British royal household and UK government are required to regularly disclose and answer formal parliamentary questions about all public funds allocated to royal family activities, a standard he said the Davis administration was deliberately flouting despite its legal obligation to report all spending to the Bahamian parliament and electorate. Sands went on to claim Davis was “drunk on power” and prioritizing lavish events and gatherings over delivering basic public services, arguing that the hidden costs of the royal visit came directly out of tax and VAT revenue that should have been allocated to fix widespread road potholes, reduce crippling multi-hour wait times at public hospitals including Princess Margaret Hospital and Rand Memorial Hospital, and prevent frequent unplanned power outages that disrupt households across the archipelago.
Sands also resurfaced a list of long-unresolved financial transparency concerns that he said the Davis administration had never adequately addressed for the public, including alleged government contracts linked to slain local businessman Warren “Spy” Ellis and Eric Gardiner (who was arrested in the U.S. in May on cocaine and firearms conspiracy charges), unreported election campaign spending, the un-audited National Investment Fund, and opaque financial arrangements for the national electricity grid. He noted that the Ministry of Housing and Land Reform had stated in September that no records existed to show Ellis or any of his affiliated companies had received housing contracts from the Davis administration, but argued that other linked spending questions remained unaddressed. The FNM chairman also revisited the controversy over Davis’s 2022 trip to Bermuda, where he spoke at a convention for Bermuda’s ruling Progressive Labour Party alongside a PLP delegation: the prime minister had initially confirmed public funds covered the cost of the chartered flight, and later told the House of Assembly that the political party would reimburse the full sum, a repayment that Press Secretary Clint Watson confirmed was completed in January 2023 at a total cost just under $60,000.
To date, no agency of the Bahamian government has published a full, itemized breakdown of costs for the King’s state visit. The day before the monarch arrived, Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell told reporters he could not share a total cost figure or confirm expenses had been formally itemized, though he insisted the spending was appropriate for a visit by the King of the Bahamas and would not “break the bank”. In September, Finance Minister Michael Halkitis stated that relevant government agencies were still finalizing all associated cost calculations and that the full figures would be released to the public in due course. Prime Minister Davis has defended the visit as a high-impact diplomatic win that generated valuable global international exposure for the Bahamas, noting he had received outreach from global contacts praising the country’s hospitality during the royal tour. Separately, the Bahamas National Reparations Committee has also publicly objected to the use of taxpayer funds to cover the royal visit costs, citing the United Kingdom’s brutal history of chattel slavery and centuries of colonial exploitation of the Bahamian people as a core reason public money should not be spent on hosting the British monarch.