Bahamas heads for early election on May 12

By Jasper Ward

April 1 (Reuters) - Voters will head to the polls in the Bahamas for an early election on May 12, the prime minister said on Wednesday, as the Caribbean nation battles affordability issues.

The announcement came the day the government scrapped a value-added tax on unprepared grocery items to help ease a cost of living ranked as the world's sixth highest by statistics site Numbeo.

Prime Minister Philip Davis said he would dissolve parliament on April 8 and formally call the election the following day. An election had not been due until mid-October.

"As we move through this election season, I ask every Bahamian to remember one simple truth: wherever we may fall politically, we all love this country," Davis said in a statement.

At the last election in September 2021, Davis' Progressive Liberal Party ousted the then governing Free National Movement.

The May election is expected to be a contest mainly between the two main parties, the PLP and the FNM, though a smaller third party, the Coalition of Independents, which has recently drawn attention, will also be in the fray.

No prime minister of an independent Bahamas has ever been elected from a third party, and the last time a prime minister was reelected was in 1997.