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This is Vinciman reporting from capital city Kingstown.
“Today I have here with me two very important political figures in this beautiful island of St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG). On my left is the currently elected GULP Prime Minister Dr the Honorable Rhelp E Gonesoft, and on the right is the Honorable Cawin U Usedus the elected leader of the opposition UNDP. Welcome gentlemen”
Vinciman: “Mr. Usedus Sir, I would like to start with you. Could you please tell our viewers what it is that you’re NOT pleased with, concerning the last Dec9’ election results, and why do you believe it was stolen”?
Mr. Usedus: “Thank you Vinciman. I just want to make this clear to everyone; we don’t have a Prime Minister in this land. The elections were stolen and what we have is an illegal government. I got a phone call right after the late count in Central Leeward, and someone (I’m not going to call any name) told me that GULP stole the elections, that the elections were stolen”. (Loud Cheers coming from UNDP supporters and onlookers)
Vinciman: “Dr Gonesoft, care to respond”?
Dr Gonesoft: “Thanks coMr.ade Vinciman, it’s good to be here. I see all our supporters in red looking very sharp and well behaved with their broad smiles, civility and pleasantries, and I can say that they are not only well disciplined but confident, very pleased and satisfied with the outcome of the results, and I must say I myself I’m also comfortable to a much higher degree with the outstanding results, the broad victory and the overwhelming popular support which gave us that extra margin, culminating in a resounding defeat for the opposition UNDP and a magnificent win for the GULP. (Loud Cheers coming from GULP supporters and onlookers)… Lots of boos, coming out from the UNDP side).
What Mr. Usedus said is wrong, plain wrong. Ah mean, just listen to how he gets his information; somebody called him and said Rhelp thief the elections! You ever hear such foolishness? Mr. Usedus always gets his information from “somebody” somewhere, someplace, telling him something, and it is just plain wrong, just plain wrong. Come on, as opposition leader you does get your information any real substantial info’, from “somebody” calling to tell you something about Rhelp, eh? And that Rhelp thief the elections? Eh? You ever hear such foolishness, such rubbish? Ah mean … the GULP won this election with a bigger margin than ever, and we had International observers present in this country. You had your own people there, too, your own lawyers you brought from overseas, and you even brought your own photojournalist, too, that fellow, what’s his name? (“Somebody shouts out Hamlet”!) …Yes that’s the fellow, to verify the claims that it was free and fair. Mr. Usedus needs to stop this nonsense with his somebody tell him this, somebody tell him that. Politics is not child’s play; politics is serious business, for serious individuals. Mr. Usedus should know better, ought to know better”! (Loud Cheers coming from GULP supporters and onlookers)
Vinciman: “Thank you Mr. Prime Minister! Mr. Usedus, on the question of the phone call, can you say with certainty that your source was credible and the information you received was reliable? And isn’t this not the kind of thing you want to rely on when one is dealing with hard evidence, with hard facts? What I mean is, a phone call is not really hard evidence, a fact, that the elections were stolen, care to elaborate”?
Mr. Usedus: “I was told that there were a “number of irregularities” in several polling stations, and the matter with the “stolen ballot box”, the “unsealed ballot boxes”, and I stand with the phone call. People don’t call just to tell me lies; I believe all that they tell me.
Let me make this very clear. Don’t tell me where I can and can’t get my information from, “YOU OUTA YOUR PLACE”. “ASK RHELP” where he gets his information from? People meet me all the time and give me information tell me things, all kind of things about what is happening on the ground. These people are well informed; very well informed, they know what’s happening, and if they say it’s so, then I believe it is so. So don’t tell me where to get my information from. “YOU OUTA YOUR PLACE”! (Loud Cheers coming from UNDP supporters and onlookers…lots of boos coming from GULP supporters… one guy shouts out “The Economist, the Economist. Mr. Usedus is an Economist”!)
Vinciman: “Dr Gonesoft care to respond”?
Dr Gonesoft: “This is real foolishness. Mr. Usedus is claiming that his source for credible information to handle serious business as leader of the opposition is a phone call which sometimes is nothing but foolish street talk, idle gossip? Is that how he wants to run a government eh? Is that how he wants to lead this country? Ah mean, anybody could call me and tell me this or that and I just take it and run on the air with it without first checking it out eh? You ever see Rhelp do that? This is what Mr. Usedus does all the time, all the time. Somebody always telling him something, or he hears something, ah mean this is real foolishness.
Let us take a look at what the UNDP is claiming. Like the story with Doggie De Fraidus getting on radio and telling UNDP supporters to follow the ballot boxes to Layou, because he suspects the GULP was about to steal the elections, inciting people to take to the streets and to go up to Gov’ house etc, to hamper or impede the swearing in of my Cabinet? These folks are just living in some fairy-tale land, expressing their neurosis and fantasies in ways unbecoming of intelligent people. They should sign up for the “education revolution” after all.
You could steal elections in St Vincent and the Grenadines, eh? Ah mean, (Chuckles)”… (Loud laughter from the GULP side…lots of boos from the UNDP side with a guy shouting at the top of his voice “…Dem thief, Dem too thief”!)
Vinciman: You’re right Dr Gonesoft that probably started the whole thing. I myself stated on numerous occasions that the “education revolution” is a marvelous thing. Mr. Usedus, anything you want to say?
Mr. Usedus: “Listen to me, this is getting nowhere. Dr Gonesoft is “OUTA HIS PLACE”. Why is Dr Gonesoft trying to defend himself in this manner, why is he trying to disprove the fact that he stole the election? Why can’t he just admit it? He stole the election, and that is my party’s position and my position and we will hear this matter in the courts. I’m of the strong belief that he stole all the past elections, and we didn’t even challenge him then, but we challenging him now. Let him prove that he didn’t steal the elections, let him prove he didn’t steal the elections? This must stop now; we won’t have any of this! (Loud Cheers coming from UNDP supporters and onlookers… Cries of “Dem thief, Dem too thief”! GULP supporters singing to the top of their voices … “tek yo licks like a big man”! A song made popular by Calypsonian Lord Have Mercy.)
Vinciman: Mr. Usedus you’re saying that the GULP stole all the elections, but do you have any evidence, any proof to back-up your claim that the elections were stolen, sir? In matters like these Mr. Usedus, it’s usually the accuser or plaintiff who has to provide the evidence to back up their claim and not the accused”?
Mr. Usedus: “Didn’t you hear what I say? I said someone told me that Rhelp stole the elections. I don’t need any evidence or no proof. If my phone calls say he stole the elections then he stole the election! I’m not paying him or those overseas monitors any mind. We have seen too much of this tomfoolery going around, so we have presented our case to the court and we will see what happens, and if the court didn’t rule in our favor, we will be protesting for the next five years until the next elections, until we get justice, until this country is free from Gonesoft and his GULP and we the UNDP are returned to government, let us be very clear on that”. ( Loud cheers coming from the UNDP side chants of “Rhelp must go, Rhelp must go … gey rid ah them”!) Lots of boos from the GULP side singing “tek yo licks like a big man”)
Vinciman: Dr Gonesoft what’s your take on that?
Dr Gonesoft: “I’ve said before that politics is for big men, not children. What does Mr. Usedus mean when he states that he does not need evidence, doesn’t have any evidence, only a phone call telling him that I thief the election. Is that what he going into the court to tell the court, that “somebody” call him and say I thief the elections … ah mean, what madness is this? You say you have a case, you say you see irregularities, you say you see unsealed ballot boxes, you say all kinda things about a decent woman, Ms Finely, and that the electoral office is involved in complicity for helping the GULP win the elections, and all the evidence you have is a phone call telling you Rhelp thief the elections? Eh? (Lots of boo’s coming out from the GULP side. Loud singing of “take yo licks like a big man … chants of “gey rid ah dem” coming from the UNDP side”).
Mr. Usedus needs to go into retirement soon; he might be losing his marbles, or has lost them completely. Why would any serious minded individuals turn to these people for leadership or guidance, why would any serious individual put their lives, their children lives, their future, their well being in a party that functions, that exists on a platform of gossip, on hear-say”? That is madness! (Lots of boos coming out from the GULP side, more singing of “tek yo licks like a big man. UNDP seems restless but quiet, no chants!)
Vinciman: “Gentlemen could we wind this down a bit, and final question. Mr. Usedus are you convinced beyond a doubt that the election was stolen by the GULP, even though member countries of Caricom, the OAS and the Commonwealth have given their approval that the elections were conducted in a free and fair fashion and the GULP won. Are you then disputing their claim, and isn’t this a slap in the face for these organizations and in a sense nothing but blatant contempt and disrespect for and against a UN sanction body of monitors? What say you”?
Mr. Usedus: “Let me make this very clear; let us be very clear on this matter. If they have to look shame, then they just have to look shame. That is my position, and that is my party’s position” (Loud “boo’s” coming from GULP supporters… cries of “Gey rid ah dem“coming from UNDP)
Vinciman: “Dr Gonesoft, any last words”?
Gonesoft: “I would like to say to the people my labour family, and also those members of the UNDP who having shown their disapproval in so many ways, by their street protest, their harassment of the elections supervisor and her entourage, the threats and the suspected arson etc, I will like to say to all that in this election and leading up to the elections, everything that was done was done, conducted in a most democratic fashion culminating in a resounding victory for the GULP, and a loss for the UNDP. Now, everyone has a right to their own opinions about what might have happened, but not a right to their own facts, and in all practicality all probability, the facts are there, as clear as ever. The GULP won and the UNDP lost. I might further add, that some folks like to go about spreading nasty rumors, deliberately trying to undermine GULP and the coMr.ade, and that the government controls the courts, and all that foolishness, but that is just plain rubbish. The court is and still remains an independent entity in our beloved SVG, and Usedus and the UNDP knows that!
Thank you! Good Bye! Labour Loves You” (Loud cheers from the GULP side …lots of boos from the UNDP side).
Vinciman: “Thank you gentlemen! This is Vinciman signing off from beautiful Kingstown, capital city of St Vincent and the Grenadines…SEE YA”!
Ladies and gentlemen hold on a bit, HOLD ON! I think Mr. Usedus has something more to say to us!
Mr. Usedus: “Thanks Vinciman. UNDP supporters, I’ve just received a phone call that Dulyhan Frankest was seen lurking by “Bigger Chicken” business, and I’m asking all of our supporters to head to “Bigger” now, head to “Bigger” now! We wouldn’t stand for any more foolishness from the GULP! …Patches, call Luzette for me, and tell her to order four wings and four vegetable fried rice for me — oh just tell her “four in a row”. Hurry!
Vinciman: Mr. Usedus please Sir, NOT AGAIN! Not another “PHONE CALL”? Good Lord!
Reggie “Vinciman” Wright
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