There’s an old saying, “be careful what you ask for, you just might get it”.
For years now, I have been saying that Denzil Douglas is the gift of gaffe that keeps on giving. And what is the latest of the innumerable gaffes he’s made in the past and during this current election cycle and how is it related to my topic? Well, he has now resorted to calling members of the opposition “hypocrites”. And one of the ironically hypocritical arguments he and others in his illegitimate administration have been making in a desperate and futile effort to arrest their plummeting political fortunes is that members of the opposition took the double salary for the 30th anniversary of independence from the same administration that they have been calling illegitimate.
Section 52(1) of the St. Kitts and Nevis Constitution says, “There shall be a Prime Minister of Saint Christopher and Nevis who shall be appointed by the Governor-General.” Section 52(2) says, “Whenever the Governor-General has occasion to appoint a Prime Minister he shall appoint a representative who appears to him likely to command the support of the majority of the Representatives.”
Since the 11th day of December 2012, in the year of our Lord, the whole world has known that six of the eleven elected members of Parliament do not support Douglas. That means that he no longer meets the constitutional requirement to be Prime Minister and thus he is illegitimate and the administration that he has in place is also illegitimate! You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to appreciate that! We have an old saying, “what gone bad at morning can’t come good at evening” and, for want of a better analogy, just as moneys gained from illicit means cannot be legitimized by laundering through a legal financial institution, an individual who does not meet the constitutional requirement to be Prime Minister cannot, at any time, legitimately occupy and function in that office.
In the people’s interest, the country has to function and we need an administration that is known to legitimately represent their wishes. Citizens at home or abroad, heads of government and members of the diplomatic community, people in the investment community and the community of multilateral organizations, all must regard our administration as being unquestionably legitimate at all times, else they would not be inclined to do business with it, which explains why we are not now getting foreign investment in this country. The truth is, all we are getting in terms of investment is our passport money being given to foreigners, a la Kittitian Hill and Christophe Harbour, from the SIDF slush fund to bring back in and the funny thing is, for some strange and audacious reason, Douglas expects us to buy that warped pursuit as direct foreign investment!
Now, let’s take the argument they are trying to make that the opposition members, unlike other public servants, should not have taken the bonus that was paid for independence. On that basis, we could now conclude, that the illegitimate Douglas administration is in the habit of using taxpayers money to pay people who are not worthy of compensation from public funds! Could that be the rationale for eighteen years of reckless spending that made St. Kitts and Nevis the second most-indebted country in the world?
And does it also explain how we got before the IMF under a structural adjustment programme that has:
• a 17% VAT killing us;
• an 85% increase in electricity charges choking the life out of every residential and business consumer;
• civil servants either being laid off or reeling on a three-year frozen pay as the cost of living goes sky high;
• our economy in shambles, recording declines in economic output over the last five years;
• young people unable to find work;
• big, local companies like LIME, TDC and S.L. Horsford watching helplessly as their profits plummet and they struggle under the weight of the callous, misguided and self-serving fiscal policies of an illegitimate administration?
Does it shed light on profligate Douglas spending that has:
• the country in debt for some $300 million at LaValle with nothing to show but a two-mile dilapidated, “green monster” fence;
• teachers and students at the Basseterre High School still getting sick, after years of neglect, in a chemically and biologically contaminated environment;
• some $100 million spent at Beacon Heights by Social Security to build some ten houses;
• some $30 million spent on prototype and other electricity generators that had to be replaced after malfunctioning;
• some $20 million in cost overruns on the poorly constructed, according to the Caribbean Development Bank, FT Williams highway;
• millions of dollars reportedly spent last year to clear away some one hundred acres of land at Ogees in St. Peters for a phantom housing development;
• some $30 million allocated for the Sandown Road/Frigate Bay Road/Timothy Hill road project, including the roundabout at ECCB that is taking forever to complete and where every day it seems the plan changes?
Is it “hypocrisy” that has our country’s credit rating in the tank because Denzil Douglas defaulted on some $2 million in government bond interest payments, forcing the country to undergo a debt restructuring programme that so far has cost Social Security some $30 million; National Bank some $50 million; TDC some $2 million; Churches and other institutions and individuals millions of dollars as a result of a Douglas imposed “haircut”? And whilst our country, our people and critical institutions suffer, up to $1 billion of our passport money is stashed away in an SIDF slush fund, being used to buy political favours just before an election that all public opinion polls say Douglas will lose?
Douglas and the members of his illegitimate administration are in no position to call our people “hypocrites”. The dictionary says a hypocrite is “a person who pretends to be what he is not” and for over eighteen years Denzil Douglas has been fooling the people of this country, acting as if he really cares when all recent public opinion polls indicate that a substantial majority of the people in this country do not trust him. Our people are well aware that Douglas only pretends to be looking after our interests when in fact he has been looking after his own interests and personal agenda, acquiring untold and undisclosed wealth for himself, friends, family and foreigners.
At this time, the people of St. Kitts and Nevis do not want to hear any talk about “hypocrisy” from Douglas and his illegitimate administration, but instead want an opportunity to elect a government of their choice. A government that will bring our people together and implement social and economic policies and programmes that benefit all the people all the time, not some people all the time. What the people want is equality in our society, not pervasive and persistent division that continues to endanger our future. What the people want is a government of National Unity and a bold initiative for change that puts jobs, healthcare, education, national security and social cohesion at the top of a prosperity agenda that will ensure sustainable growth, development and wealth creation so that all of us, not just Douglas, his friends, family and foreigners, but all of us could live the good life.
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