OBA Confirm Andrew Simons As Candidate
[Updated with video] The One Bermuda Alliance has confirmed that Andrew Simons will be their candidate for the by-election set to be held in Constituency 13 Devonshire North Central.
Mr Simons attended Stanford University in California as a Bermuda Government scholar and graduated in 2005 with a bachelor’s degree in computer science and a master’s degree in chemical engineering.
The by-election has been prompted by the retirement of PLP MP Glenn Blakeney, who submitted his resignation letter to the Speaker of the House, confirming his retirement effective December 7th.
The date of the Devonshire North Central by-election has not yet been announced, however the formal writ is likely to be announced in the coming days, while the actual by-election is likely to be held early next year.
In the 2012 General Election, Mr. Blakeney defeated the OBA’s C. Anthony Francis by a margin of 19 votes, winning 51.18% of the vote [411 votes], while Mr. Francis won 48.82% of the vote [392 votes].
In the 2007 General Election, Mr. Blakeney won 53.52% of the vote versus the UBP’s Albertha Waite, and in the 2003 General Election, Mr. Blakeney won 57.22% of the vote versus the UBP’s Hilary Soares.
The PLP has already confirmed that Senator Diallo Rabain will be their candidate in the constituency.
Mr Simons full remarks are below:
Thank you for joining me in Prospect today. This is one of the vibrant, diverse, and close-knit neighbourhoods in Constituency #13, Devonshire North Central. I am honoured to have been selected to run here for the One Bermuda Alliance.
I am running for Parliament because I am passionate about public policy, and I recognize that many major problems can only be resolved through the political process. Bermuda faces some difficult decisions in the next few years in areas as diverse as reducing the debt and providing services to an aging population.
There are no simple solutions to many of these problems; we need to have island-wide conversations about the choices and tradeoffs we face. In addition, some of these problems will require cooperation between the Government and Opposition.
As an officer in the Royal Bermuda Regiment for the past six years, I have taken an interest in the welfare of my troops. I have seen them and their families struggle to find jobs, pay for health insurance, negotiate the court system, and keep a roof over their heads. Fortunately, the economy is improving under the OBA government. However, many people in the community continue to feel the impact of the great recession.
Folks are tired of “politics as usual”. I believe that an MP’s role is to serve his constituents, to listen, and to assist. I live in Devonshire, so I see the issues that are important to this constituency such as illegal dumping. I wish each constituent to know that I am available to assist with the personal challenges they face. I want to be a resource for them.
I believe that my education, work experience, service as an officer in the Royal Bermuda Regiment and membership on a number of government boards have a prepared me to serve the residents of Devonshire North Central and all the people of Bermuda.
I graduated from the Berkeley Institute before going to the Hotchkiss School in Connecticut. I attended Stanford University in California as a Bermuda Government scholar and graduated in 2005 with a bachelor’s degree in computer science and a master’s degree in chemical engineering. For two years I worked at EMC, a big technology company in Boston, before moving back to Bermuda eight years ago to work in reinsurance as a catastrophe modeler and risk analyst.
After returning home in 2007, I was called up by the Royal Bermuda Regiment and was commissioned as an officer in 2009. I have served as an immediate response team commander for the past two hurricane seasons, and was embodied during Hurricane Joaquin. I was recently promoted to the rank of Acting Captain.
As a member of the Bermuda Health Council, I am proudest of my role in encouraging the BeHC to pursue employers who do not provide health insurance for their employees. My experience on the board of CedarBridge Academy and the Pembroke Parish Council has shown me how challenging it can be to get things done in Government.
I believe that I have the skills, commitment, energy, and integrity to serve the interests of this constituency well.
I look forward to meeting all the residents of Devonshire North Central, from Prospect in the west to Loyal Hill and Chaingate Hill in the east, over the coming weeks. Until then, I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Update 12.12pm: Photos from today’s press conference
Update 12.53pm: In introducing Mr. Simons, Premier Dunkley said, “I am proud and excited to be here today to introduce the One Bermuda Alliance candidate for the Constituency 13 bye-election, Mr Andrew Simons.
“I’m proud because Andrew has emerged from a number of good people who put their names forward to be our candidate in this bye-election, and I am excited because he is an immensely capable young Bermudian whose candidacy, when you boil it down, is driven by love of country.
“Andrew is fired by a deep commitment to make Bermuda work better at every level and by confidence in his abilities to make a difference. I think you need that in politics – that fire and that belief to actually bring about change.
“It is for this reason that I am really pleased Andrew has thrown his hat into the ring for the one Bermuda Alliance. He brings a lot to the table. He is a highly trained individual, with Master level degrees in computer science and chemical engineering.
“He is a catastrophe modeller in Bermuda’s reinsurance industry. His public service record reflects serious interest in public health issues and the economy, with seats on key government advisory boards. He is a member of the Cedarbridge Academy Board of Governors and he has served on community-based boards that work to help people.
“Andrew is also a recently promoted Acting Captain in the Bermuda Regiment. This broad experience will help him serve the people of Devonshire North Central. On that point I am proud to vouch for his good character and dedication to public service.
“Andrew will not let you down. He is a man of his word and a man of conviction, who understands the meaning of public service. He is a New Generation leader who carries a far-sighted commitment to building a Bermuda that works for people in every sphere of life.
“That’s what we’re working for as a government, and Andrew’s candidacy is an opportunity to support that commitment.
“We are a government in mid stride; making progress on many fronts; in the midst of economic turnaround; with progress in public safety; new measures for open, transparent and accountable government; and the rebuilding of our tourism industry.
“There is a lot of big work happening, that will make this Island work better for all. I say let’s keep it going. Support the recovery. Elect Andrew Simons to represent the people of Devonshire North Central, and help us keep working for you.”
Awesome! A QUALITY guy!
I’d like to see a live debate between Rabain and Simons. I’d like to really get an understanding of both candidates.
How about a live debate between Dunkley and Bean.
I know why y’all are disliking, because de sour milk will get flushed down de toilet, but he will win the Mr. photogenic competition !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
LMFAO
OBA members don’t like to do debates. Many of their members aren’t strong enough or knowledgeable enough to have a debate.
Their only answers would be:
A. It’s the PLP’s fault
B. It’s the PLP’s fault
C. It’s the PLP’s Fault
Nice bio, but how do you feel with your party slashing the scholarship fund from $700,000 to $40,000 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh I forgot, America’s Cup.
Lies.
Actual scholarship funding this year has been increased by $200k to $1.2mn
Seriously?????? Name ONE instance where MONIES were handed over for the America’s Cup…
EVERY single dollar of a scholarship fund is ACTUALLY handed over…kinda hard to do when you have NONE to give!!!!
You have NO clue what-so-ever…..
People across the board have already benefited from the AC. The money invested is long gone into the economy.
Reply To Onion Juice.
Slashing to try and recoup from the previous administration.
pure lies ………..again.
@Onion Juice. If we had all that missing money there may well be plenty of money to fund the scholarships. Did you ever think of that BUD.
Congratulations to this bright young Bermudian. A very courageous act to enter the arena of politics. I wish him well.
I don’t believe this young man has walked in the average Bermudian shoes who are suffering one way or another.
@ fast forward…play a victim and you get nowhere in life. Get up and do something!
Why? Is it because he is well educated (i.e. Berkeley and Stanford)?
So is his opponent Rabain as he attended Saltus and Florida A&M.
The first time that Stanford and Florida A&M have ever been used in the same sentence
Give the young man a chance, its his right, just hope you give high sentiments if Arron Hill and his like would run for P.L.P. ….RIGHT !!!!!!!!!
No doubt this is an astute young man, but you can have more degrees then a thermometer, dont mean to much if you dont do what ya paid to do.
Whats missing from politics is people who have no grassroots experience, to know the needs of the PEOPLE.
Not taking away the young man’s achievement which I endorse, but Ben Carson is a Brain Surgeon and he dont have a CLUE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Grassroots….almost the most overused term of the year.
The winner we all know.
Do you mean Eron Hill?
Error
Please Florida A&M on the same level as Stanford!
So all of a sudden where you go to school matters? Don’t sell me that garbage. A college degree doesn’t mean much these days. You can learn everything you can in a classroom on the Internet and through experience. It’s more about individual merit than the school you attend.
As per Col. David Burch:
———————————————–
“I encourage Bermudians not to send their children to Mickey Mouse universities to get Mickey Mouse degrees because no one will employ them,” he said to much applause at a public meeting in April 2010.
“It is pointless doing that and then coming back and have the expectation that you can take that piece of paper and walk into a CEO job. There is a gap between the two, it is called work and effort.”
—————————————————-
He attended Berkeley Institute and went on to do well based on his own efforts. Why don’t you form an opinion after you’ve met him?
Well…I believe he worked pretty damn hard for those Stanford degrees and that because of that hard work he has no need to put himself at the public trough, perhaps making his motivations less self serving than others.
Andy is almost inhumanly hard working. He holds down a demanding job, is a Regiment officer, serves on government boards, AND did a major public service in creating bermuda.io.
This is an example of a young Bermudian that has maximized the options he has created for himself and come home to try to help.
Fast forward–you are not at all what your name implies with that type of retrograde comment.
Thank you Mr. Simons–I wish you the best of luck and hope you will be sucessful and become an inspiration to all young Bermudaians to come home to try to help with the mess that the older generation have left us!!!!
Simons is an educated man interested in improving his country and needs not justify himself via some past BS street Cred.Instead he does something real and mentors young boys through regiment service.
Robain is a good self made man and this riding is very fortunate to have 2 intelligent caring candidates. If the candidates in past elections were at par or above the caliber of these two men,Bermuda might be in a better state today.
Give it a rest. Are Zane, Wayne, Marc Bean and Diallo suffering?
why? Because he got off the wall, worked really hard and didn’t wait for it to be given to him? Is this why he is not like the average BERMUDAIAN male!
Didn’t know he was ever on the wall.
PLP supporters make me laugh. First you have Zane talking about there is no advertising for tourism, then you complain about spending money on the AC, which gives us more exposure then we could otherwise afford. We are now getting more and more people coming in for sailing competitions, and speaking about how great the sailing is here. Then there is the Endeavour programme. We are renting more housing for the teams, and the support staff for the teams are here spending money in Bermuda. We have to look at the money as an investment, and not as a lump sum payment. The return on that investment is what will help Bermuda as a whole. Of course I know that there will be the naysayers who will say that the money is going to the rich, and not the poor. I disagree.
Andrew is a solid candidate for the OBA. Senator Rabain is equally as solid for the PLP. This would be a tough vote if I was a constituent. Knowing that the OBA already has the majority of seats in Parliament, it would have to come down to who is able to represent my interests the most.
That would be Andrew Simons then.
It comes down to the demographics of the constituency.
Senator Rabain will get my vote. The OBA needs to go.
Voting for Rabain will not achieve your aim. Seems a bit pointless.
I’m more interested in where this picture was taken… I’m loving the background scenery!
Photo opp #1,694
The fact that there is a MP constituency with less than 1000 voters just highlights what a joke the Bermuda government is.
Dear Mr. Simons,
We commend your decision as an educated Bermudian to get involved in Public Service.
You gave the people of Constituency 17 an undertaking that you would run again in our Constituency at the next election, why have you decided to go to 13?
Also, why were you not properly prepared for the Press Conference above? Please replay your responses and start working on how you reply and whether your answers are fluzzy or contain the depth that we know you are capable of.
When this is all done and you are elected, please remember that there are many of us who are more qualified than you, but don’t have your connections who have been left behind and are refused opportunities in IB in our own country (and we Don’t support the PLP either), don’t get lost in the mix and pageantry of politics when you are elected, please.
Wishing you all the best,
More Reality
If you had any qualifications (CA, CFA, FRM) you could have your pick of IB jobs. Don’t expect a job to be handed to you if you have done nothing to deserve it.
That doesn’t give you the pick of IB jobs. It’s more about who you know then what you know.
A lot of people in high positions are completely clueless anyway and many didn’t earn their spot. Let’s just say some people go it handed to them on a silver platter.
That’s just not true. If you were qualified for my job, then I would not be able to get a work permit.
Another one in fantasy land.
You just sit back and relax in your comfy chair and leave all the clueless people alone . If you are lucky maybe some of that money will trickle into your lap.
What are your superior qualifications
and, as importantly,from where?
These two are the types of candidates that Bermuda is deserving of. Andrew Simons and Diallo Rabain are both upstanding men of high calibre. I’d be proud to have either represent me
Agreed!
This will be a close election….
Good luck to both
May I ask what your positions are on Human Rights for ALL our citizens – Do you support Same Sex Marriage ?
With any luck he will get this seat. I mean who would still vote PLP? The clinically insane perhaps.
I am voting for the Senator as he is the best candidate.
+1
I all read your distasteful commands when my Diallo Rabain was announced as a PLP candidate for Constituency 13. I would like to say what has Mr. Simons done for the country? Don’t tell me he sits on boards and he is in the Bermuda Regiment. That sure isn’t doing anything for the Country. Anyone can sit on the boards and sign up for the Bermuda Regiment. The first thing comes out of you OBA supporters is the debt the PLP put the country in. You all need to get over it and do what you should do as a government. Even if the PLP do have bright intelligent young persons, there is always something negative to say. These are two intelligent your men running for Constituency 13, therefore you really should be excited that our young people are doing something positive for the Country not tearing each other down. You all don’t know anything about my nephew, therefore you should be careful what you say. I know for a fact that he is interested in the people of Bermuda. I have seen this for myself. Therefore shut up and have positive views for our young people. Since you all think you know everything and the OBA are always correct with their vision, then why don’t you all run.
The PLP could have the most qualified candidate in Bermuda history and the OBA supporters will still continue to ridicule and scrutinize. That’s why I will never vote OBA because of their biased supporters.
well that is just silly.
not voting for the best becuase of others who support them?
talk about not being logical at all.
so you would rather see bermuda fall to the bottom of the ocean based on some supporters of the OBA? \
smh
and there we have it folks. the reason bermuda is where it is.
Bermuda will not fall to the bottom of the ocean – Shut UP. Here the bigotry begins with the nasty OBA supporters who say just about anything can negative regardless of the article or anything.
I’ll be voting PLP next election too. I still haven’t seen these 2,000 jobs.. Nothing is improving. I’m ready for a new PLP to be back in office.
What about the constant denigration of the OBA representatives and their supporters by the PLP and their supporters? Is that bigotry or righteous indignation?
Read on here the hatred as well as the hatred spewed on the radio by PLP supporters. The rhetoric spewed by you and yours is ten times nastier than any OBA critique. You claim people that don’t support the PLP aren’t real Bermudians, that they are racists or Uncle Toms, you threaten violence and civil unrest every day.
All of the above (along with the PLP debt and mishandling of Govt finances) is why I will not vote for that joke of a Party.
But you will vote for the PLP because people criticize, and rightly so, the PLP actions while in Govt? Pathetic.
And it is telling in the post above that the poster states we should get over the PLP debt that is sinking this island. It shows that you do not have a clue on how the economy works and the damage that the PLP debt is doing to this island. You guys are the reason that we are where we are as of today.
That comment right there shows how much you guys hate Bermuda and value PLP power over everything. Party before country with you lot each and every time.
That jobs board has had quite a few since it started.
How much jobs have we lost since the OBA took over? To get 2,000 they would need to create like 4,000 lol
Those 2000 jobs you’re looking for, their the ones destroyed by the plp that you voted for.
So how many white people have voted for P.L.P in the past, its no secret white people DONT vote for P.L.P regardless how much U.B.P. F!@#ed up and still F!@#ing up.
Its only Black People that swing vote because we are socially conditioned by white supremacy.
Sad but true.
I don’t vote for the PLP.
No different as to why black Americans vote overwhelmingly for Democrats and shun Republicans.
Your stances from immigration to gay rights mirrors that of the Tea Party extreme.
I think you’ll find quite a number of white people did vote PLP in 1998.
Your racist rants and hate, which was a strategic part of the 2012 campaign probably has alienated most of them (I was there on the field, I heard it).
Name the white supremacists in Bermuda please….go on, or is it just political speak to stir up misinformation and a racial divide. (you know the things the PLP is failing because of)
Your wrong on that point, Historically it’s been proven that race has always been the main factor in politics in Bermuda and Blacks have been swayed towards the U.B.P. for upgraded social status, not negating the fact that Historically in Bermuda in order to vote you had to be a land owner (go figure) and when that changed the boundaries where systematically inhabited to stack the deck.
White people and a few honorary blacks had no interest in voting for P.L.P because their business allegiance was tied to Front Street and Historically Front Street was and still is the force of the Elitist in Bermuda and their circles consist off the exclusive yacht, dingy and golf clubs.
I cant name the white supremacist individually because it is a collective system that has been ingrained in our society, just like U.S., South Africa, etc.
OJ: I used to think you were fairly balanced, but that was because you have a chip on EACH shoulder.
“Its only Black People that swing vote because we are socially conditioned by white supremacy.”
Socially conditioned, you mean like a slave?
Ya “mental slavery”, that’s why you have relatives of a Freedom Fighter who supports an organization that opposed and oppressed the Freedom Fighter, but relatives of the oppressor NEVER supports the oppressed !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Now that’s some F!@#ed up S!@#
Uh the oba isn’t always correct, facts are. People that go on about the debt should get over it? Their children’s children might be lucky to get over that. Since you’ve said “my Diallo” and “my nephew”, you clearly have a bias opinion. What ever happened to my island, my Bermuda? Despite the parties they’re both promising candidates despite the fact Simons couldn’t lead 10 men through a corn field, trust me.
I served in the Bermuda Regiment during the time of Simons so the corn field piece made me laugh because I know what you are talking about lol.
You were the one who pooped his pants? lool
This will be close:
In the 2012 General Election, Mr. Blakeney defeated the OBA’s C. Anthony Francis by a margin of 19 votes, winning 51.18% of the vote [411 votes], while Mr. Francis won 48.82% of the vote [392 votes].
The PLP have done themselves no favors with the controversy about the leadership of their party.
Quite frankly I see the OBA wining this seat. The margin of PLP victory has shrunk over the last couple of elections. It does not help that the leader of the party has spoken so badly regarding some women he has had “run-ins” with. If anything, the women of Devonshire North Central should send a strong message.
If the bye election is purely about the candidates themselves and not the PARTY….. then the two are most capable. Like I said: It will be close…..
what happened to mr francis
simons can not identify with the folks in that area and he knows it
He lives in the area.
Will be hard for him.
Rabain is a strong candidate.
Well if he takes after his Father and Mother he will be indeed an assest to the people.
Thanks Pat.
Gerald Simons will live on.
Shalom.