Former PM blasts Govt

FORMER PRIME MINISTER Freundel Stuart has criticised recent decisions of the ruling Barbados Labour Party (BLP) Government, saying politics here was “broken”.

During a special meeting of the St Lucy constituence branch of the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) on Sunday in North Stars Cricket Ground, Crab Hill, Stuart said Barbados was not in a good place and there was political, social and economic evidence to prove it. He said the island was rushed into becoming a republic without a republican constitution, and Government seemed ashamed of the findings in the report by the Constitutional Reform Commission.

The former Prime Minister also cited the proposed relocation of the Holetown Civic Centre, of the Graydon Sealy Secondary School and of the Barbados Defence Force. Stuart said he and the DLP had been closely involved with each institution and there had never been any complaints so he did not understand why “all of a sudden” they had to be moved. He said the proposals were not something the DLP could have gotten away with.

“If the DLP had taken such decisions, everyone in the Barbados National Trust would be suffering from laryngitis from all the shouting, but one of the tragedies in Barbados is, despite all the wrongdoings, there is a manicured, pedicured, dressed-up and perfumed silence in Barbados on critical issues,” he said.

Excuses

Stuart also spoke about crime, saying Barbados had averaged 50 murders a year for the past three years. He said crime now seemed to be everybody’s problem, but when the DLP was in power, it only seemed to be the problem of himself and former Attorney General Adriel Brathwaite.

Stuart also referred to the arrival of the Afrexim Bank, and it being given land. He said the “excuses” given were it was like the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), but he pointed out that the CDB was a regional project, while Afrexim had no roots in the Caribbean.

“In all of this, I’m just saying that the level of transparency required in decisions like that was not forthcoming from the present Government. We have to be concerned about how power is being used in Barbados and for whose benefit. The almighty dollar is more important now than any other time in my lifetime because people are really experiencing some challenges.

“What we are seeing in Barbados today is an accumulation of wealth on one hand, to one set of people, and the decay of people on the other, and that is an issue that the Democratic Labour Party, as a party of the people, has to confront,” he said.

Stuart said it was not the role of the Opposition to give Government advice or answers, as its role was to protect, support and fight for the people of Barbados. He said, if the BLP did not know what to do, it should “get out of the way”. (CA)

FORMER PRIME MINISTER Freundel Stuart

(right)

receiving a greeting from Democratic Labour Party candidate for St Lucy Alvin Toppin following the

meeting. (Picture by Jameel Springer.)