No real time will be spent in Parliament by the NDP – Eustace

Leader of the Opposition Arnhim Eustace has made it clear that although he has been sworn in as a member of Parliament, he and the other Opposition members do not plan to spend any real time there.

“Because you can be out of Parliament and go into Parliament for five minutes and be out 10 minutes later; so we know what the rules are, so we will deal in accordance to the rules, but we certainly not going to spend any real time in the Parliament,” said Eustace, while speaking on the New Times programme yesterday.

The NDP president assured supporters that instead, the party will concentrate on protests and the cases they have filed before the court.

“I want people to understand me clearly. Our concentration would be on the case and on the protests that are needed as we see it and we will be doing some fine tuning to that programme today…,” Eustace stated.

He urged supporters not to be afraid because the real battle is to come.

“So don’t be afraid…don’t be afraid, the real battle is to come. The real battle over what happens to the seats in North Windward; what happens to the seat in Central Leeward; those will come now that we have filed the petition on December the 30th, 2015.”

On Thursday, December 31, the NDP filed two petitions challenging the results of the December 9 general elections in the constituencies of North Windward and Central Leeward.

Eustace also stated that he believes that many persons have lost confidence in the judicial system.

“There are a lot of people who don’t really have confidence in our justice system as we would expect or what we would expect in a democratic society, and that is not today; a lot of that confidence was eroded before today.”

Eustace described as “foolishness” calls by persons who say that they should accept what happened and move on.

“That is foolishness. The kind of corruption that we have in the system, here now, our system will collapse if we continue as it is. Not only the parliamentary system will collapse, but our economy will also collapse, which is what people live by. Our values are collapsing because we are now accepting wrong as right,” he stated forcefully.

Since the general elections of December 9, which the Unity Labour Party (ULP) of Dr Ralph Gonsalves won, eight seats to the NDP’s seven, the NDP has refused to concede defeat, alleging irregularities and corruption. The general elections were, however, declared free and fair by observers from the Organization of American States, the Commonwealth and CARICOM.