A Little Bit Independent

Clouds of balloons floated out over the harbor and bright flags decorated staid old Bay Street in downtown Nassau. Past the reviewing stand, filled with bewigged and berobed colony officials, marched rows of schoolboys while policemen in starched white uniforms stood stiffly at attention and thousands of children sang and cheered. Thus did something called "limited independence" come to the Bahamas, Great Britain's 700 islands scattered over 90,000 square miles of sunny ocean off the tip of Florida.

London will still handle defense, internal security and foreign affairs. The Bahamians will take care of the rest, and for the island's 110,000 inhabitants that sort of limited self-rule seems quite enough. Declared portly Sir Roland Theodore Symonette, 65, head of the ruling United Bahamian Party and Premier under the new constitution: 'There is no need for independence. I would never agree to it. We need guidance from the mother country, and that is what we are getting."

Banks & Bunkers. The Bahamas are getting more than guidance from abroad--though not so much from Mother Britain. Long a tax haven for investors (no income tax, only a modest property tax), the Bahamas are pulling in new capital so fast that some call the islands "the Switzerland of the Western Hemisphere." One of the biggest law offices in Nassau 'is literally speckled with shingles identifying the "registered offices" of U.S. corporations basking in the balmy tax climate; so many wealthy Americans and Canadians are transferring funds south that Nassau boasts no fewer than 15 banks. "When we arrived in 1947," says an officer of Barclays Royal Bank of Canada, "there was only one bank in Nassau. Now we ourselves have 16 offices around the Bahamas."

Banking is only part of the boom. The main island of New Providence will soon have a new $2,800,000 Bacardi rum factory; such firms as Bethlehem Steel, Whirlpool, Owens-Illinois Glass and Outboard Marine have come in with overseas sales offices. On Grand Bahama, a $1,500,000 bunkering terminal pumps more than 1,000,000 bbl. of marine fuel a month into vessels from all over the world, while close by a subsidiary of U.S. Steel is building a $50 million cement plant. Even the cold war is pumping life into the sultry economy. The U.S. Air Force has four huge missile tracking bases in the Bahamas, plus more than 70 smaller stations dotted along the island chain. On Andros, the biggest Bahama of them all, the U.S. and Great Britain are spending $100 million to build an Atlantic Underwater Test Evaluation Center (AUTEC) for submarines.

Money Making Money. Tourism, of course, is still king, and the Bahamians know that the islands will never support heavy industry. Says Sir Stafford Sands, 50, Minister of Finance and Tourism: "We're best off selling the product we have--the world's best climate plus easy accessibility to the world's biggest travel population." Drawing 546,000 tourists last year, the Bahamas doubled Bermuda's tourist intake, outdrew Jamaica 3 to 2, and ranked only behind Puerto Rico in total Caribbean tourist trade. Some Bahamians feel that their archipelago will soon outstrip Puerto Rico, and Sands predicts a 1,000,000-tourist year by 1971. One new lure: gambling. In the Bahamas' first real plunge, a casino opened its doors this month at Canadian Financier Lou Chesler's Lucayan Beach Hotel on Grand Bahama.

The only rain cloud over the Bahamas these days is political, and that may be more imagined than real. Nine out of 33 seats in the island assembly are held by the all-Negro Progressive Liberal Party, whose membership includes one man who campaigned in last year's general election on a promise to distribute the Royal Bank of Canada's money among his supporters. But the P.L.P.'s reins are firmly in the hands of capable Lynden O. Pindling, 33, a London-educated lawyer whose main disagreement with the United Bahamian Party is over taxes. Pindling feels that the rich could contribute a bit more through stricter collection of property taxes or even a business tax. But he is not about to advocate an income tax. After all, who wants to kill the golden goose?

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