The cleaning, the promise, the pressure

EDITOR: The Honourable Julian Francis ought to be applauded for having admitted, even in the Parliament, that the capital Kingstown was decidedly in a most unsatisfactory condition, from the standpoint of health and hygiene. One remembers that several years ago when Madam René Baptiste was the representative of West Kingstown, she had led a team of prominent and important persons in a fact-finding walk around Kingstown.{{more}} The perception was that the city needed a thorough cleaning up. However, nothing was done after the well publicized walk, and so today, almost 10 years afterwards, the situation remains the same and quite likely has gotten worse. A most eloquent indictment of the quality of management of Dr Ralph Gonsalves’ ULP regime.

The evidence of this mismanagement is almost palpable as one walks through the city and the rural districts of our unfortunate land. Neglect, indifference and lack of pride are veritable prominent signposts today and those who have undertaken the responsibility to manage must be held accountable. Also, those of us who empowered them with the privilege, particularly those of us who were their strong advocates, should feel duty bound to express our disapproval of these blatant deviations from promised undertakings.

I have heard that Dr Gonsalves had made a promise to the captain of the victorious West Indies cricket team Darren Sammy, and I believe that every Vincentian would approve the gesture, but I say it would be immoral and flavoured with hypocrisy, if when the promise to Sammy is effected, the old promise to Butcher, Ole George’s walking partner had not yet been made manifest. Give Butcher that which was promised on behalf of the people!

One of the most painful exhibitions of failure to keep promises is the abandonment of the banana industry by Dr Gonsalves and his team. Vincentians no doubt would remember that in 2001 when Dr Gonsalves and his ULP team sought the mandate from the people, they firmly promised that they were going to exert themselves to ensure the revitalization of the vital banana industry. Included in that revitalization was to be the rapid restoration of the vital feeder roads. The farmers were won over, for it had been perceived at that time that the Mitchell regime was not particularly keen on agriculture. His accent seemed to be on tourism, but his approach had not been well thought through. The wastage of precious funds on the Union Island project is irrefutable testimony to that!

Yet, since 2001, it cannot be said that a really serious effort has been made to address the recurring of the Dr Gonsalves and his team; we have neither banana trade nor feeder roads. The farmers were duped and the communities which had traditionally depended on agriculture for their welfare became so impoverished that recently the pre-electoral “material inducements” may well have been successful in blinding them from dispassionately examining the issues affecting them and identifying the authors of their agony. But they will learn now through the “pressure”.

One cannot help but note the indifference, the failure of the intelligentsia to recognize the importance of agriculture to us. The Chamber of Industry and commerce should have felt impelled to intervene when it was clear the agri sector was being stifled. Merchants, traders and professionals have joined the farmers and others “in the water”, all feeling the “pressure”.

Leroy Providence