Bahamas Income Tax is Coming

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

24 August 2026

DAVIS GOVERNMENT MUST SUSPEND ITS SECRETIVE BIN ROLLOUT: BAHAMIANS WILL NOT ACCEPT INCOME TAX THROUGH THE BACK DOOR

The Coalition of Independents condemns the Davis administration’s reckless, secretive and potentially unlawful attempt to force a new Bahamas Identification Number—BIN—upon the Bahamian people beginning September 1st, with virtually no meaningful public notice, no proper consultation and no clear explanation of the legislation authorizing its full scope.

Giving the public barely days to understand and begin complying with a sweeping new tax-identification system is not good governance. It is an administrative ambush.

The Government claims that this new BIN will bring together real property tax, business licence obligations and other taxes under one identification number, while the existing TIN will apparently remain connected to VAT. That raises an immediate and fundamental legal question:

Where is the law authorizing this new, compulsory, all-encompassing tax identification system?

A press conference is not an Act of Parliament. A budget speech is not an Act of Parliament. A government policy, website or administrative circular cannot create new legal obligations, new penalties or new barriers to accessing government services unless Parliament has authorized them through legislation or through properly made subsidiary legislation.

Article 52 of the Constitution establishes Parliament as the body empowered to make laws for the peace, order and good government of The Bahamas. Laws are made through Bills passed by Parliament and assented to according to the Constitution. The executive branch cannot simply announce a new compulsory legal regime and treat its own announcement as law.

The VAT Act does contain a limited power allowing the Comptroller to issue a taxpayer identification number to a person already liable to pay tax. But that provision does not give the Government a blank cheque.

It does not plainly authorize the Government to:

- Create a universal national tax identity for every Bahamian, whether or not that person is liable under the VAT Act;

- Compel citizens to make an entirely new registration under threat of penalties or denial of services;

- Combine information collected under separate tax statutes without clear legislative authority;

- Transform a VAT-related identification power into an all-government financial-surveillance system;

- Make the BIN a condition for receiving unrelated government services;

- Change who is liable to pay a tax, the amount payable, filing requirements or statutory exemptions;

- Impose new penalties or enforcement measures that Parliament has not enacted;

- Apply new requirements retrospectively; or

- Share citizens’ personal information across agencies for purposes that were never disclosed when that information was originally collected.

If the Government intends to do any of these things, it must identify the exact statutory provisions authorizing each action. If it cannot, then those actions would be outside its lawful authority—ultra vires—and vulnerable to judicial review.

Each Bahamian tax presently exists under its own legislation. VAT, real property tax, business license fees and the Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax do not become one tax merely because the Government builds a new computer portal. An administrative platform cannot amend multiple Acts of Parliament.

The Government must also explain whether any rules, regulations, orders or notices governing BIN have been properly made and published in the Official Gazette. It must disclose:

1. Precisely who is legally required to register;

2. The statutory authority creating that obligation;

3. What information applicants must provide;

4. How that information will be verified and shared;

5. What penalties, if any, can lawfully be imposed;

6. Whether a person without a BIN will be denied a licence, tax-compliance certificate, property transaction or government service;

7. What appeal and correction procedures will exist;

8. What protections exist for senior citizens, Family Island residents and persons without reliable internet access; and

9. Whether the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner has reviewed and approved the collection, linking and use of this enormous body of personal information.

The Data Protection (Privacy of Personal Information) Act requires personal information to be collected fairly and lawfully, retained for specified lawful purposes, protected against unauthorized access, and not used or disclosed incompatibly with the purpose for which it was collected.

The Government therefore cannot merely take information supplied for one statutory purpose and quietly convert it into a centralized financial profile of every citizen. It must disclose the legal basis, purpose, security standards, access controls, retention period and inter-agency data-sharing arrangements governing BIN.

This is particularly troubling because the Government’s first use of BIN was connected to the Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax regime—a 15 percent tax system applying to qualifying multinational corporate groups. Now the same identification architecture is being expanded across the domestic tax system.

Let us be clear: the BIN does not, by itself, legally impose a personal income tax. Parliament would still have to pass legislation to create such a tax.

However, the BIN creates the centralized taxpayer architecture that would make an income-tax system easier to administer, monitor and enforce.

Before the election, the Coalition of Independents warned the Bahamian people that once the votes were counted, this Government would begin laying the groundwork for income tax. The election is now over, and the machinery is being put in place.

We believe that BIN may be the opening move—the taxpayer spine—upon which a future personal income-tax regime will be built.

The Bahamian people must therefore treat this as an unmistakable warning: income tax is on the horizon unless the public stands up now and demands complete transparency.

If the Davis administration says that we are wrong, then the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance should issue an unequivocal undertaking that this Government will not introduce personal income tax, payroll tax or any equivalent tax on the earnings of Bahamian workers.

Do not tell us that BIN is merely about “convenience.” Tell us why a separate identification number is needed when taxpayers already have TINs, property assessment numbers, business license numbers and National Insurance numbers.

Do not tell us that this is simply “modernization.” Publish the law, publish the regulations, publish the data-protection framework and explain every power the Government intends to exercise.

The Coalition of Independents is not opposed to technology, efficiency or the collection of taxes that are lawfully due. We oppose taxation by stealth. We oppose government by press conference. We oppose the creation of sweeping administrative powers without parliamentary scrutiny, proper notice, public consultation and clearly defined legal safeguards.

The Government’s answer to every fiscal failure cannot be another tax, another fee, another identification number and another hand in the pockets of struggling Bahamians.

Our people are already burdened by VAT, customs duties, high electricity bills, expensive food, business license fees, real property tax, fuel costs and countless government charges. Bahamian families cannot survive another assault on their salaries.

Taxing the Bahamian people to death is not an economic plan.

The Bahamas is not a poor country. It is a resource-rich country that has been poorly managed.

Instead of preparing to tax the earnings of nurses, teachers, police officers, construction workers, small-business owners and struggling families, the Government should be developing new national revenue streams from the assets that already belong to the Bahamian people.

We should be:

- Transparently monetizing our natural resources for the benefit of Bahamians;

- Maximizing properly regulated carbon-credit revenues and ensuring that the proceeds reach the Public Treasury and our people;

- Building meaningful Bahamian ownership in the cruise industry instead of allowing foreign cruise companies to extract billions from our waters while leaving us with crumbs;

- Developing Freeport into a world-class shipping, transshipment, ship-repair and logistics centre, with Bahamians holding ownership and leadership positions;

- Harnessing solar energy throughout the archipelago to reduce imported-fuel costs, lower electricity bills and create a new energy economy;

- Establishing Bahamian-owned boutique hotels, eco-resorts and overwater-bungalow developments throughout our Family Islands, particularly the neglected southern islands;

- Developing a national network of first-class marinas capable of capturing a greater share of the international yachting economy; and

- Creating sovereign and public-private enterprises that generate recurring national income without crushing Bahamian workers.

Other countries build national wealth from shipping, energy, natural resources, tourism assets and strategic state investments. The Bahamas must do the same.

Our national policy must be simple:

Stop taxing Bahamian survival and start monetizing Bahamian sovereignty.

The Coalition of Independents calls upon the Government to suspend the September 1st BIN rollout until it:

- Publishes the complete legal authority for the programme;

- Publishes every applicable regulation, rule, penalty and enforcement procedure;

- Conducts genuine public consultation;

- Provides a reasonable registration and transition period;

- Discloses the complete data-protection and inter-agency information-sharing framework; and

- Gives the Bahamian people an unequivocal answer on whether BIN is being constructed as the foundation for personal income tax.

If the Government refuses, the Bahamian people will be entitled to conclude that this is not simply administrative modernization.

It is preparation.

It is surveillance.

It is the construction of a new tax net designed to catch every Bahamian worker, homeowner and small-business owner.

The Coalition of Independents warned the country before the election. We are warning the country again today:

Wake up, Bahamas. The machinery for income tax is being assembled before our eyes.

Lincoln Bain Leader Coalition of Independents