History will be favourable to Luzette King

Editor: She rubs many the wrong way. She is a hardliner by any definition. But, history will be kind to Luzette King, as a strong pro-black, social development protagonist. Many words have been ascribed and said, both in print and on electronic media about her. It is true to assert that she has made many enemies since starting her popular Saturday morning radio programme “Call it George,” formerly “Global Highlights.” {{more}}It is also true that she has made some statements that were less than couth. However, love her or hate her, one will be hard-pressed to find another woman or man who has championed the rights of the marginalized, the downtrodden, victimized, the forgotten and the voiceless as she has, in recent memory.

Her voice, including her positions on talk radio, is incomparable. Her detractors may attempt to disparage her with half-truths, character assassination and innuendos, but ultimately fail. Luzette may have been dubbed an ‘Internet Crazy,’ but for those on whose behalf she soldiers on, she is indeed our own Rosa Parks. She cannot be considered an “insignificant power-hungry sore loser,” as one letter writer said. An insignificant person will be left to the shadow of him/herself. However, on a daily basis as ‘insignificant’ as Ms King is, an immeasurable amount of talk radio hours are spent discussing her every word and action.

Further, I can only imagine the ‘scorn and ridicule’ by many whites in America who were similarly against civil rights activist Rosa Parks. Even some blacks may have berated her as an ‘ideological extremist.’ I can hear the chorus of the blacks who followed the rules, “what little upstart Rosa playing, sitting in the back of the bus; she only looking for fame.” People do not stand up against injustices or wrongs on the basis of a popularity contest. When Rosa Parks sat at the back of the bus, it was not to make friends, but for what she considered just and fair; in the words of letter writer C-ben-David, “for the end of segregation and other forms of racial oppression that degraded and marginalized Black people in the United States during the 1950s.”

The simple truth is that SVG is segregated politically. Political party patrimony is the single greatest hindrance to national cohesiveness and people development. There are many in our country who face political oppression, have been degraded and marginalized. The only difference is that the black man is doing it to his own brother and sister.

We will become a more harmonious, productive society if only our efforts can be spent on fixing the inexcusable social disparities within our society, rather than attacking the messengers. Take away Luzette King from the equation and we still wake up tomorrow in a country a ghost of its former vibrant self, dressed in masking garbs of education certificates and some infrastructural development.

I credit Luzette King as that voice which reminds us before we sleep, that today we did little towards making tomorrow a better place to live, work and play for each and every Vincentian.

Adaiah Providence-Culzac

adaiah.culzac@gmail.com