Michael Clifton Pintard (born 3 July 1964) is a Bahamian politician serving as Leader of the

Free National Movement The Free National Movement (abbreviated FNM) is a political party in The Bahamas formed in the early 1970s, led by Sir Cecil Wallace Whitfield. The current leader of the party is Michael Pintard and his deputy Peter Turnquest. It dominated the ...

and Leader of the Opposition since 27 November 2021. He has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Marco City since 2017. First appointed in 2010, he served two terms in the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

. He was the Minister of Agriculture and Marine Resources from 2018 to 2021.

Early life

Pintard was born in Nassau to Sister Laura Benson (née Hepburn) and John S. Pintard. He attended AF Adderley Senior High School and pursued an

Associate degree An associate degree is an undergraduate degree awarded after a course of post-secondary study lasting two to three years. It is a level of qualification above a high school diploma, GED, or matriculation, and below a bachelor's degree. The fi ...

in Agriculture at the

College of the Bahamas A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...

. He went on to graduate with a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

Agronomy Agronomy is the science and technology of producing and using plants by agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, chemicals, recreation, or land conservation. Agronomy has come to include research of plant genetics, plant physiology, meteorology, and ...

from

Tuskegee University Tuskegee University (Tuskegee or TU), formerly known as the Tuskegee Institute, is a private, historically black land-grant university in Tuskegee, Alabama. It was founded on Independence Day in 1881 by the state legislature. The campus was d ...

in 1988 and later complete post-graduate courses in Agricultural Economics at

McGill University McGill University (french: link=no, Université McGill) is an English-language public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter granted by King George IV,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill Universit ...

in 2002. He also took a summer programme in Writing with the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. , the university enrolled 19,096 students in 12 colleges and schools across nearly 350 academic majors and programs, incl ...

and holds a certificate in compliance and anti-money laundering.

Career

Before going into politics, Pintard worked in consultancy with Scribes Ltd., radio broadcasting and art and theatre management, and urban planning. He helped to found Congo Town Development Ltd. Pintard was sworn in as a Senator by then Prime Minister

Hubert Ingraham The Right Honourable Hubert Alexander Ingraham, PC (born 4 August 1947) is a Bahamian politician who was Prime Minister of the Bahamas from August 1992 to May 2002 and again from May 2007 to May 2012. He is a member of the Free National Moveme ...

on 7 April 2010. He was appointed again for a second term in 2014, when the FNM was in opposition. He ran for the Cat Island, Rum Cay & San Salvador parliamentary constituency in the

2012 Bahamian general election General elections were held in the Bahamas on 7 May 2012. They were the first general election in which a third party (the Democratic National Alliance) offered a full slate of candidates alongside the two major parties, the Free National Move ...

. He tried again in 2017, this time for Marco City and won. He was appointed Minister of Agriculture and Marine Resources by

Hubert Minnis Hubert Alexander Minnis, ON (born 16 April 1954) is a Bahamian politician and doctor who served as Prime Minister of the Bahamas from May 2017 to 16 September 2021. Minnis is the leader of the Free National Movement, the former governing party, ...

in July 2018. He was in office to oversee and report to the news about

Hurricane Dorian Hurricane Dorian was an extremely powerful and catastrophic Category 5 Atlantic hurricane, which became the most intense tropical cyclone on record to strike the Bahamas, and tied for strongest landfall in the Atlantic basin. It is also reg ...

in 2019.

Bibliography

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pintard, Michael Living people 1964 births Free National Movement politicians Government ministers of the Bahamas Members of the House of Assembly of the Bahamas Members of the Senate of the Bahamas People from Nassau, Bahamas McGill University alumni Tuskegee University alumni University of the Bahamas alumni