By: Precious Mills
BASSETERRE, St.Kitts (MARCH 2018)- To date, three out of the four new candidates of the opposition St.Kitts-Nevis Labour Party have made at least two Party public attendances although an official launch is yet to be made on the Party’s end to complete its eight-member slate.
Notably, even before the candidates made such an extent of public showing, word has been circulating about their names and occupation and at least two are said to be employed within the public sector. Hence, for some people their (the candidates) recent outings have confirmed their identities in light of gossips going around.
Those incoming candidates are for Constituencies One, Five and Seven who are set to replace Dr. Asim Martin (Deputy Leader of the Party), Dr. Norgen Wilson and Dr. Vance Gilbert respectively while Glenn ‘Ghost’ Phillip will be changed in Constituency Four.
Most recently at the Party’s public meeting held in St. Paul’s on Sunday 25th February, Party Leader and Parliamentary Representative of Constituency Six Hon. Dr. Denzil Douglas energised the crowd as he went through of the list of representatives in signaling his Party’s readiness to contest the next General Elections, asking in between if the three candidates were at the event.
Some members of the crowd were seen going wild with excitement applauding and cheering while those close enough hugged, tapped the backs and shook the hands of their already confirmed representatives.
Although sending a message of defeat to Hon. Lindsay Grant- the Parliamentary Representative for Constituency Four of the PAM Party- a Labour Party candidate for that area has not yet been confirmed.
The first political outing for the three candidates was the Party’s town hall meeting held on Tuesday 20th February at OOJJ’s Conference Centre in Camps.
Douglas, during his presentation, indicated that the candidates were present and also expressed hope that they were listening closely to the matters being discussed.
When approached by this reporter after that meeting and questioned about how soon the candidates would be officially be made known to the public, he replied: “Very shortly. We have a timetable and so we’re working towards it.”
Douglas added: “They are here and the idea was to bring then so that they can begin to appreciate what is meant by the representatives speaking in a way to educate the public and at the same time engendering support among them and so this is part of the training exercise which as we have been saying, started from the beginning of February.”
At the Party’s recent protest against the actions of Speaker Michael Perkins, a non-supporter of the Labour Party was observed verbally monitoring the crowd to see if one of the supposed new candidates, who is said to be a civil servant, was there.
“If [name withheld] here by dis protest, he need to be turn way from he job right away!” she expressed.
A protestor tempted to respond to that woman was encouraged by his fellow comrade to ignore her and instead focus on the business of the day.
At the recent public meeting, it was stated that the parliamentarian Marcella Liburd will remain in Constituency Two as well as parliamentarian Konris Maynard in Constituency Three while Dr. Terrance Drew will continue to represent Constituency Eight and Dr. Douglas in Constituency Six.
The method of arriving at the choice of candidates is being conducted through a new body called the Candidate Selection Advisory Committee.
At the Party’s monthly press conference held this week (Wednesday 28th February), Douglas informed that the process has been reliable noting that altogether eighteen (18) individuals applied.
“The process has been extremely reliable and has turned out a number of candidates who applied to be with Douglas at this time. Eighteen persons came on board and even those who Harris is saying do not want to be there anymore, they applied (and) went through the process of application, subjected themselves to extensive interviews.”
He added: “and so I want to say to the people that from the process, we will have a new team, young people. Maybe myself and Marcella will be the only two who would have contested for more than one election and we will be introducing to the country a new group of persons with a different appeal understanding very clearly where we’ve come from, understand the delivery that they have to make in the advancement of our country, middle income group and to the young people in particular who want a different type of politics and who want empowerment in our country St.Kitts and Nevis.”
In regard to the candidate selection in Constituency Four, Douglas told: “We are making sure we do the right thing in Constituency