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Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves. (File photo by Lance Neverson/Facebook)
Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves. (File photo by Lance Neverson/Facebook)
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Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves, on Sunday, divided St. Vincent and the Grenadines into the main island and the rest of the archipelago as he attempted to explain what he said is the difference between the political situation now and in 1998.

In 1998, the New Democratic Party (NDP) was re-elected to office, having won eight of the 15 seats in parliament under the nation’s first-past-the-post system.

However, the Unity Labour Party (ULP) — of which Gonsalves was deputy political lead and is now leader — won the popular vote.

Gonsalves, then an opposition lawmaker, wrote an article, “One Is Not Enough In St. Vincent and The Grenadines”. He argued that while the NDP had the legal authority to rule, it lacked political legitimacy.

In 2000, the NDP agreed to early election amidst political unrest, and the ULP won those polls, which were held in March 2001.

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And, in the Nov. 5 general elections this year, the ULP won a fifth consecutive term in office, when it won nine of the 15 parliamentary seats.

One of those seats, North Leeward, was won by a single vote.

However, while the ULP won the majority of the seats, it lost the popular votes, meaning that more persons who voted on election day voted for the opposition party.

Since the polls, the opposition had noted Gonsalves’ position in 1998 when the situation was reversed and the opposition ULP won the popular vote.
Speaking on WE FM on Sunday, Gonsalves acknowledged the article which the opposition has quoted.

“But it is not only a question of context, it is a question of what are the facts dealt with in that article,” he said, and quoted the headline of the article in part —  “One is not enough”.

“And in what context one is not enough, what is the factual matrix? That they had 45% of the vote and we, in 1998, had 55%.

“Well, for heaven’s sake, if anybody can’t see the difference between a half of one percentage point difference now, which amount to even-steven and 10 percentage points, they are delusional,” Gonsalves said.

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Gonsalves has tried to paint the situation now as different from 1998, when he argued that a government that did not have the popular vote lacked political legitimacy. (iWN photo)

He, however, did not say at what percentage point the majority vote counts as the majority vote.

The prime minister said that the opposition must not quote just one sentence of his article.

“They must quote the article and look at it in its totality and look at the title, ‘One is not enough’ and the point I was making, simply is this: if you win by one seat, as they did in 1998 — the NDP — and you are trailing by 10 percentage points, that one seat is just not enough in those circumstances.”

He said he did not think that was a difficult proposition to have accepted “given the understandings, a number of concepts relating to political legitimacy and the question of legal authority”.

The prime minister said that he had made the point in the article that the NDP had the legal authority to govern.

“Well, that legal authority now is even being questioned by the NDP. They are questioning the legal authority of this government to govern.  And what they are doing, they are conflating quote-unquote political legitimacy and legal authority.”

He said legal authority is “one of the inputs toward political legitimacy.

“Legal authority, authoritativeness, those are foundation stones toward political legitimacy but political legitimacy also requires the consent of the governed. And that consent is made manifest with what is the factual situation.”

He said that the factual situation on the ground is that SVG has 13 seats on the main island and two in the Grenadines.

On St. Vincent Island, the ULP won nine of the 13 seats, Gonsalves said.

“We lead by nearly 2,000 votes, on this main island, St. Vincent. Of course, the Grenadines are part of St. Vincent and the Grenadines and we will long remain so though that the NDP founder had never resiled from his Grenadines Declaration and I haven’t known if the Grenadines itself has ever done so and that is a document on record to them.

“But the difference is, currently, half of one percentage point. Therefore, the concept of proportionality comes in because legitimacy is always tied not only to authoritativeness and legal authority but very much to effectiveness.”

Gonsalves suggested Martin Lipset’s book  “Political Man” written in 1960 and the work of Rothstein and Buchannan as reference material on the issue of political legitimacy.

He noted that the ULP has a two-seat majority.

“And I wrote an article about one is not enough and it is very fascinating to see that they are trying to quote my article without understanding the richness of the article in its totality and I am not resiling from what I said. I am only quoting the factual situations.”

He said that some persons would argue that legal equals legitimacy.

“And that is correct from a narrow legal standpoint but the elastic concept of political legitimacy goes beyond legal authority, though it includes legal authority. 

“But the NDP wants to take the concept of political legitimacy without the input of legal authority and authoritativeness and the actual facts themselves and are spewing them and are thinking that 2020 is a reprise of 1998, which it is not, factually.

“… I will tell them this: if they think this is a reprise, this is a repeat of 1998, they will find in me a formidable man of the streets. I don’t have to say more than that.”

Gonsalves, however, admitted that political legitimacy is “an elastic concept”.

“And then we do have the consent of the governed, I am saying, because what we do have here is on the ground, a sliver, less than half or half of one percentage point or thereabout is the difference, and the way it is spread, in our political system, and in our territory will tell you it is statistically insignificant and negligible and does not go to any legitimacy issue. Only if you are delusional you’ll hold that position,” he said. 

9 replies on “Confronted with his 1998 reasoning, Gonsalves splits SVG in two”

  1. Ralph E. Gonsalves continues to act very much like Donald Trump or is Donald Trump acting like him. When Trump won the election is 2016, he said it was by a landslide, now he lost by the same number he cannot concede he lost by a landslide. Ralph’s argument of the matter in 2000 is exactly what has occurred in 2020, he lost the majority vote however he cannot admit it. How does one separate the Grenadines from St. Vincent? Are they not a part of the state? They do not belong to St. Vincent, they are a part of the state of St. Vincent & the Grenadines. He calls himself “an ancient warrior”, ” a man of the streets”, we the people of the street voted against you and the ULP and all your rhetoric will not change how history will speak of you.

  2. Urlan Alexander says:

    Ralph you have Vincentians as a bunch of nitwits, a people with little sense. You have demonstrated your contempt of the populace on more than one occasion. Your continued pissing on the intelligence of this small country is open for all to see. On every occasion that your words have come back to haunt you, you always find a way of saturating the intelligence of the few people who ought to know better. Indeed the master of contradiction in you, has clearly caught up with you. Your words have come back to haunt you. Maybe if you had attributed your flip flopping to youthful exuberance it might have gone down better…but then again you were in your 50s when you utter those words. Fool may not be talking but they are not listening either.

    1. Urlan, Blame our people for allowing ralph to piss on our intelligence. How can we accept $100 and trade our votes and our lives? The NDP offered to reduce VAT to 13%, to remove VAT from basic food items, to pay for all CSEC and CAPE subjects, to reduce student loans interest by half, to create employment and have our people working. And they voted against all of this for just $100.00!!! Well let them go eat doodoo!!

      I am appealing to all persons, when these ULP supporters come begging you, send them over to the complex; even if its your mother. Not a red cent!!! They are the ones who have us in this poverty stricken situation.

  3. Unfortunately, the apathetic and ‘nice guys’ attitude is what is also aiding and abetting this Gonsalves monopoly on the people of SVG. While the voters threaten protest and hitting the streets, the NDP slinks into retreat like a beaten dog instead of fighting for the majority who obviously want to see them rule SVG. Ralph has flipped the script from 1998 to serve his mandate, why can’t the NDP push this issue and force him to call an early election? It worked for Ralph. It’s time to stop playing nice. Nice guys finish last.

  4. Fat Ralph has become an elected dictator who gets into power through corruption and lack of an effective Opposition. The sooner the Opposition find someone intelligent who can get the attention and respect of most of the people the sooner Fat Ralph will be out to pasture and investigated for skimming Argyle Airport for almost $100 million and investing some of that in One Caribbean – and that’s just a start.

    The key is Opposition leadership all of the leadership of the Party – which Vincentians can look up to. Rum shop chatter, corruption and politricks is no longer valid as a strategy.

  5. Is this worst than being a liar or a narcissist ? In addition is this a paranoid, delusional and grandiose thinking ?

  6. Ralph is trying to project on us, what he is himself. Delusional. by calling us delusional he is placing us into an altered state of confusion. But when its politically expedient ,Ralph will act. hoping that when he makes off-the-cuff remarks we all will forget. For the most part we do forget, that’s why people like him and others get-away with murder. Ralph has successfully split the country, he has over the years set vincentians against each other, and he doesn’t have the intestinal-fortitude to fix it. frankly he couldn’t care less . But something has to give. There are people living in SVG who are doing very well, regardless of the government in power. They are not in a hurry for change, but there are those who don’t have anything and dont ever expect to get a goddamn-thing.But those people have a boiling point, now all of us should stop and take notice, morning is coming for all of us, go figure vincy people voted against 13% vat just saying

  7. Dr Friday and Dr Gonsalves both won their seats overwhelmingly by defeating their opponents like rabbit vs turtle. All other seats were narrowly won. If NDP cannot figure out a strategy to reverse this after 19 years ( losing 5 times in a row ) who to blame? If two more NDP supporters had voted in North Leeward then Patel would have won. Why blame Carlos James or someone in the Electoral Office? If the people of SVG wanted the NDP in office this time it was the easiest opportunity. Have you noticed how many people did not vote, some 30 + thousand ? Enough to win a third party into power. Instead they chose to go about their daily lives and could have cared less who win or loss. Now let’s pick up the pieces and move on. Accept the results and let’s build this country. Should NDP attempt to try what Dr. Gonsalves did in 2000 by ordering supporters to the streets to block roads and protest they will be met with fire and brim stones. Their will be blood sheds and deaths. Let’s not go there.

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