St Vincent Opposition leader speaks on D’ca’s election

Godwin Friday, the Opposition Leader in St Vincent and the Grenadines is not supporting moves by the Dominica Labour Party government in Roseau to call elections.

Friday said not only are the elections two and a half years away but it was also called pending the completion of a report by Dennis Byron.

He told a local radio station in St Vincent that the haste by Roosevelt Skerrit to return to the polls is questionable.

“And, on November 6, Sir Dennis wrote a letter to the leader of the opposition and the government saying where he was with the report, and what the plan of action was going forward. He said that he would present phase one of the report in the month of November so the Parliament could then bring in legislation to deal with the register of voters sometime in December, and to be enacted, hopefully, early in the New Year, in January,” Friday said,

Friday said that Sir Dennis had indicated that after consultation, he would do phase two of his report in February or March of 2023 and then they would have further legislation again in March-April 2023.

“This is the commissioner, Sir Dennis Byron, outlining the plan for what he is going to do and then what does the government do? What does the government of Skerrit do? Disregard it entirely and call an election; say, ‘We’re going with the same thing we have here now. All them complaints that people made and so forth and all this stuff that I told you to look into, I don’t care about that I’m going to call election now.’”

He a huge amount of cash was spent on getting the report from Dennis Byron prepared only to have it wasted at the end.

“I mean, a question that people ask, well, if you have this reform, you say that reform is going ahead, that you appointed the commissioner suggests that you have accepted that the commission is needed, and you will give them the chance to do their work. And then after that you can call elections.

“But instead of that, the government has definitely disregarded the work of the commission, because it’s not done,” he said.

Opposition parties in Dominica say they will boycott the general elections in Dominica.