BASSETERRE St. Kitts, December 11th 2011 - A sitting of Parliament was scheduled for Tuesday December 6th at 11am but Parliament commenced late as usual. It began after the prime minister who was late had arrived.
Upon the arrival of the prime minister it became obvious that he was unsettled as he complained over the fact that the session had not got on its way despite his absence.
Hon Shawn Richards recalled that his colleague Hon Eugene Hamilton whispered that the prime minister was late because he wanted to duck from the questions.
He could see the agony on the prime minister’s face as he looked at the Order Paper and muttered under his breath. He could see that a colleague asked him “well you did not know about the questions?” and again he muttered under his breath.
It was quite noticeable that the prime minister had come into the Parliament empty handed; no papers; no look of being interested in the agenda of that sitting.
It was question time and The Hon. Eugene Hamilton stood and fired the first question. The prime minister ducked for cover behind employees of the Government; and after the second question he ducked again; and after the third question he ducked again.
There were only three questions allowed by a member that are to be answered verbally by the appropriate minister and in fact there were only three questions that were presented at that sitting. The questions were;
1.(a) How many trips abroad have been undertaken on Official business by each Minister of Government, for each year between January 1st 2001 and December 31st 2010 (b) the cost incurred by the State for each Minister’s airfare in each of those years and (c) the sum total of subsistence paid by the State to each Minister during each of those ten years?
2.(a) How many applications have been received and how many have been processed under the SIDF Citizenship program since its inception; (b) the cumulative sum collected by the SIDF since its inception in pursuance of this program and (c) what is the Fund balance as at September 30th 2011?
3.(a) How much has been paid to the Government for the eight hundred acres of land acquired and disposed of on the South East Peninsula and (b) the date when payment was received by the Government?
In a sorry display by the prime minister he tried to demonstrate that the questions had no merit but was guided by the Speaker on the manner in which questions were to be answered. In the end Douglas failed to answer three simple questions that were asked of him in his ministerial capacity that were submitted ten full days before the sitting of Parliament held on Tuesday.
MP Hamilton asked that the questions be answered at the next sitting of Parliament that is not dedicated to the Nations Budget to which the Speaker acknowledged that Douglas had agreed.
Soon after ducking three times in succession, demonstrating that he is not in touch with his ministry, Prime Minister Douglas sneaked out of the Parliament never to return during that sitting.
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