Recent newspaper articles about surgeon Dr. Christopher Johnson have been "nasty" and are fuelled by a racial agenda, according to Government backbencher Derrick Burgess.

He told the House of Assembly yesterday that those investigating the head of Bermuda's Road Safety Council were doing so because he was of African descent.

The Royal Gazette's sister paper, the Mid-Ocean News, has run two stories in recent weeks concerning a lawsuit Dr. Johnson filed against his former employer in the US.

The articles claim the surgeon recently got married in Bermuda, despite acknowledging in legal documents that he was gay, and that nurses at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital had refused to work with him because he was unprofessional.

Mr. Burgess told MPs: "Dr. Johnson has my full support. From what I understand he's well qualified and good at his job. It's nasty. Let Dr. Johnson continue. He has done nothing criminal."

He added: "I know they will continue to investigate people of African descent and people who support this party. I ask that this behaviour be stopped and that this newspaper decides to be more responsible."

He later told this newspaper: "They need to leave him alone. He is a citizen; he needs to work like everybody else, not to be harassed by the media for whatever reason."

Mr. Burgess said in the House that a lot of writers did not understand race but that a lot of people in the House of Assembly did as they had "lived through it".

He criticised the media for seeking out negative stories about black people. "They particularly do it to people of African descent or anybody that looks like or may support the Progressive Labour Party."

Mr. Burgess also denounced a recent column by Fred Barritt in the Bermuda Sun. The satirical piece asked: "How can you expect the Premier to survive on only $110,000 and three houses?"

Mr. Burgess said: "It's pitiful that he would write such garbage."