Vincentians in the United States have been urged to help to source fire fighting hardware for fire fighters in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
The nation’s ambassador to Washington, La Celia Prince, said at a town hall meeting in New York last week, that seeking assistance for the Fire Department was a focus area decided upon last year.
“… I am very pleased to report to you that through a sister island programme, which we started with the State Department, we were able to get some experts from Martha’s Vineyard to come down to St. Vincent and the Grenadines and they worked with our Fire Department.
“They did an extensive assessment of our needs and they actually made some invaluable input into the design of the fire unit at the international airport.
“One of the things that we still need assistance with is the hardware. Our Fire Departments need to be equipped and I think this is something that you the Vincentians in the community can possibly assist us with — working with your fire department to see when they have hardware that we can get from them.
“Whether items that have been used by them but can still be used by us for recycling. So we will encourage you to see how you can help us in that regard,” Prince said.
She further said that the executive committees of the various Vincentians groups should soon receive letters about the focus areas.
“We are looking for your assistance to get roadside traffic mirrors that we can place at blind-corners. This is something that we need, especially in the school zones. We have spoken with the Traffic Department and we are supposed to get the specs from them and we will reach out to you to work on that,” the envoy further stated.
I kept asking myself why Canada is asking for visa from SVG nationals then suddenly it dawned on me.
An official from the Canadian government tried to entrap a SVG representative here in Toronto some years ago. She wanted to get Vincentian men to marry Chinese women, so they could obtain SVG passports. I had an opportunity to speak to the lady and made it clear it would jeopardize Vincentians chances to come to Canada. I refused to accept her $10K US to marry a Chinese woman and this was after I told her I was married.
A few weeks later all or most of the Caribbean islands, except SVG and ST. Lucia needed visa to come to Canada. It stayed this way for a long time, and then other folks started getting SVG passport, like the guy Ames. No I can be wrong, but with the PM visiting those Arab countries, which are hostile to the US could have changed the tide. Its possible Al-Qaida converts could slip through SVG to Canada and the US, using a SVG passport.
This to me is a more serious problem to Canada and the US that refugee claimants.