Historical ties between PLP Bermuda and PLP Bahamas as told by L.O. 1965

In October 2022, members of the Bahamas’s Progressive Liberal Party (PLP), headed by Prime Minister Philip Davis arrived in Bermuda.

While there, Bahamian government officials also attended Bermuda’s Progressive Labour Party’s convention. At the invitation of Bermuda’s Premier David Burt, Prime Minister Davis was the convention’s keynote speaker.

Prime Minister Davis’s attendance at Bermuda’s PLP convention in 2022, was a continuation of an enduring political relationship, which began in 1949, when law student Lynden Pindling met Bermudian law students Arnold A. Francis and Lois Browne in London.

As political fate would have it, Lynden Pindling would go on to join the Progressive Liberal Party in 1953. After being elected to the House of Assembly for the Southern District 1956, he became party leader. Pindling went on to become the first Prime Minister in Bahamian history.

In 1953, the Progressive Liberal Party became the first political party in The Bahamas. Ten years later, in 1963, the Progressive Labour Party became the first political party in Bermuda.

The Bahamas had its economic oligarch group called the Bay Street Boys.

Bermuda had its economic oligarchy group called the Front Street Boys.

The white establishment government party in The Bahamas called itself the United Bahamian Party (UBP) was formed after 1953 in response to the formation of the PLP.

The white establishment government in Bermuda called itself the United Bermuda Party (UBP) was formed in August 1964 in response to the 1963 formation of the Progressive Labour Party.

In 1962, in the Bahamas’s first election under universal adult suffrage, the United Bahamian Party was re-elected as the governing party.

In 1968, in Bermuda’s first election under universal adult suffrage, the United Bermuda Party was re-elected winning 30 out of 40 seats. The predominantly negro Progressive Labour Party won 10 seats.

Bermudian Arnold A. Francis (1922-2011), who was called to the English Bar at the Inner Temple on the same evening as Lynden O. Pindling in 1952, went on to become the leader of the Progressive Labour Party in 1963 to 1965.

Bermudian Lois Browne (1927-2007), who Pindling would note in 1965, became the first female lawyer in Bermuda. Mrs. Lois Browne-Evans also became Bermuda’s first black elected woman Member of Parliament having won her seat in the first general elections contested by Bermuda’s PLP.

In 1990, the Rt. Hon. Sir Lynden O. Pindling, KCMG PC, JP Prime Minister of the Bahamas, a long-time ally and friend of the PLP in Bermuda attended the re-opening of ‘Alaska Hall’, Bermuda’s Progressive Labour Party’s headquarters. Alaska Hall was officially reopened after an arson attempt.

In 1965, under the pseudonym “L. O.” PLP leader Lynden Pindling writes a column in the Bahamian Times newspaper outlining the close ties between PLP Bahamas and PLP Bermuda