West Kingstown youth avoid being seen with Cummings — Peters

The ruling Unity Labour Party’s candidate for West Kingstown, Keisal Peters says change is coming to the constituency, which the New Democratic Party’s (NDP) Daniel Cummings has been representing since 2010.

Peters said that young people in the constituency do not want to be seen with Cummings – who, in 2020, won a third term in office by 714 votes, up from 444 votes in the 2015 polls.

Peters, a lawyer who made history by becoming St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ first female minister of foreign affairs in August 2022 before being transferred to the Ministry of National Mobilisation in July 2024, is the third person – all women — to try to end Cummings stay in Parliament.

Speaking at the ULP’s campaign rally in Calliaqua on Sunday, Peters said that the NDP wants to privatise healthcare and sell the nation’s passports, the EC$700 million port in Kingstown that will be commissioned on Saturday and the hospital under construction in Arnos Vale.

“They want to sell out our friend, Taiwan. … They want to sell our beloved country to the highest bidder,” Peters said.

She said the NDP wants to sell “the future that belongs to your children and your grandchildren and your great grandchildren, not yet born.

“… I have said before, and I will say it again, we as the Unity Labour Party cannot allow ourselves to be led down a path of unrighteousness by the New Democratic Party for their political agenda sake”.

ULP ‘red and ready’

Peters said the ULP is “red and ready” to take the country forward, give more scholarships and build more houses.

“The Unity Labour Party is red and ready for the Beaches hotel,” she said.

On Oct. 6, the government signed an agreement with confidential clauses with Sandals Resorts International for the construction of a Beaches Resort in Mt Wynne.

CEO of Sandals, Adam Stewart said the hotel will cost $500 million, will be built in phases, and the company will begin working on designs next year.

Seafood festival at Lowmans Bay

“Comrades, the Unity Labour Party wants you to be red and ready to own your future,” Peters said, adding that change is constant and is coming to West Kingstown.

“Step into the future as we transform the constituency of West Kingstown. Step into the future as we transform the beachfront of Edinboro. Step into the future as we create a modern business complex in Camden Park,” she said. 

“Step forward to the future where the fisherfolk from Rose Place at Lowmans Bay can host their seafood festival,” she said.

The fisherfolk have been waiting on the government since January 2022 to construct restroom facilities on the beach at Lowmans.

In September, almost a year after her last update, Minister of Urban Development, Senator Benarva Browne, responding to a question from Cummings, told Parliament that construction of the restroom is expected to take 10 to 12 months, with an October 2026 completion target. 

‘innovative ideas’ for West Kingstown

Peters told Sunday’s rally that she has “innovative ideas for the constituency of West Kingstown”, adding that at the start of “every meeting”, Cummings “has to invoke the spirit of John Horne, of blessed memory”.

Horne, of the NDP, who died in April 2019, represented West Kingstown from 1984 to 2001, when the NDP was voted out of office.

“After 15 years, you have to rely on the name John Horne. What kind of necromancy is this? That is nonsense! Nonsense!” Peters said.

“You have nothing to offer the young people of West Kingstown. Young people of West Kingstown doesn’t even want to be seen with Daniel Cummings, but the young people of West Kingstown know that West Kingstown is rising and we are coming for West Kingstown.”

Peters said “times have been difficult”, adding that in addition to the COVID-19 pandemic, SVG has been impacted by natural disasters.

“… and this administration has put safety nets in place to make sure that our people are taken care of,” she said, adding that the United Nations Development Program has said that St Vincent and the Grenadines is at a high level of human development.

“The Unity Labour Party has taken St Vincent and the Grenadines to higher heights,” Peters said, telling party supporters, “… politics is serious business for serious people, and I want you to own the future where every candidate here will fight for you”.

ULP ‘the last line of defence’ for SVG

She said the ULP wants to invite the people to own the future.

“But, comrades, the future does not belong to those who sit on the sidelines and complain. It belongs to those who stand up, get up and grab the future and take what is yours.”

Peters said the election will demonstrate the power of choice adding, “on our side, you will be choosing progress. On the other side, you will be choosing a bag of pledges.

“…  The Unity Labour Party is the last line of defence for St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The New Democratic Party is a national disaster pending and they will not protect and defend St. Vincent and the Grenadines, like the Unity Labour Party will.

“You don’t believe me. You don’t seem convinced,” Peters told the rally, adding that the NDP has been talking about the public debt.

“The public debt is public knowledge. Any money we borrow, we go to Parliament and we tell the people who we’re borrowing from how much money we’re borrowing and the repayment terms and what we are borrowing for. That is transparency and accountability,” Peters said. 

“But I want you to ask the NDP, what about their private debts? They spent 24 years trying to get into office. You know how much people they owe? That is why they want to sell the patrimony of St Vincent and the Grenadines. We will not allow them to do it.”