A good friend of mine sent me a document he found while doing some cleaning of his archives, it was a book written by Mr. Leonard St. Hill entitled MANIFESTO ONE  THE LAND written in 1972, and speaking about his exploits in St Lucia over a period of years ending in 1970. We are talking about forty four (44) years ago. I was amazed at the depth of thought in the development of the various proposals and must say he should be given St Lucia’s highest honour for his outstanding contribution to the development of St. Lucia. He stands tall as a true genius. At the end of the book, Mr. St Hill gives a history of his education and of significance is his training in Civil Engineering, and I then understood why such salient and critical recommendations were generated. Unfortunately engineers still do not get the respect due, Manuel Pelligrini  is more known for his exploits as a coach of...

‘’The ordinary politician has a very low estimate of human nature. In his daily life he comes into contact chiefly with persons who want to get something or to avoid something. Beyond this circle of seekers after privileges, individuals and organized minorities, he is aware of the large unorganized, indifferent mass of citizens who ask nothing in particular and rarely complain. The politician comes after a while to think that the art of politics is to satisfy the seekers after favours and to mollify the inchoate mass with noble sentiments and patriotic phrases’’ …… Walter Lippman The quotation is as relevant in the North American Democracy as it is in the Caribbean context. One has to decide whether to be a recalcitrant minority and be part of the circle of seekers or to rise into the inchoate mass, making declaratory pronouncement of one’s patriotism. Can small island states survive...

In January 1757 on the island of Nevis, a baby boy was born out of a adulterous affair of a French woman and a Scottish man, that little boy spent his first 11 yrs of life in the Caribbean in an impoverished state. However, the Caribbean experience would shape his thinking forever. The baby boy was Alexander Hamilton credited as one of the fathers of the Constitution of the United States with James Madison. The association with Hamilton shaped the thinking of James Madison who later told the US Congress: “First. That there be prefixed to the Constitution a declaration, that all power is originally vested in, and consequently derived from, the people.   That Government is instituted and ought to be exercised for the benefit of the people; which consists in the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the right of acquiring and using property, and generally of pursuing and obtaining...

Former Prime Minister Sir John Compton, in the swearing- in ceremony of the last administration he led, indicated that a “girdle of slums which surrounds our city is a veritable incubator for crime that threatens our daily lives.” He went on to inform the nation that The Ministry of Housing, Urban Renewal and Local Government had been given the challenge “to tackle the problem with determination and imagination”.  Seven years after his death, his desire for that change has not occurred. As a La Tocian ( resident of La Toc), I drive from to Castries with great sadness as I look at how a strip of land from Tapion to Manoel Street has been left in total decay. SLASPA has virtually abandoned their responsibility. Yet this is the entrance to Castries, our capital. When Sir John shared his thoughts seven years ago, as a former Chief Engineer who had worked with him, I felt led to put...

On Tuesday of this week I visited a Government Department at the Waterfront to drop off a document. I approached a young lady to hand deliver the document, only to be greeted with the most profound expression of impertinence. This young woman was probably younger than my daughter, and I froze for a while in complete shock. It was only because I am not linguistically challenged and more so constrained by the love of Christ, that my response was not filled with a volcanic explosion of expletives. There is a principle of Physics called inertia, and if you understand that principle, it is the key to reinventing government within St. Lucia. Inertia is defined as followed: ‘A property of matter by which it remains at rest or in uniform motion in the same straight line unless acted upon by some external force ‘ If an object is at rest it will remain at rest until an external force acts upon...

I am one who firmly believes that one should speak within their frame of competence, but I believe there are times when one has to express concern on matters of national importance. I listened to Mr. Richelieu, the lawyer for Hon. Mondesir, speaking of his concerns on the issue of jurisprudence. He made an important point that there is need to separate the law from the politics in this case.  Law is based on precedent, a complete distinction from engineering, and while I have an intense interest in law, I can only be described as a ‘bush lawyer’.  A ‘bush lawyer’ that will never understand why the law says that someone found with an illegal firearm should be punished the same as a man caught stealing a bunch of bananas. I will never understand why lawyers are keen to defend the rights of those who have brutally murdered innocent women and children and have never gone to a victim to...