Articles - Prudent says: ‘UWP strayed from the principles of Sir John!’ Written By: Jason Sifflet

What is wrong with this country is that too few people have too much and too many have too little.”
Yeah, yeah. But how to fix it? That’s the question. Everybody knows what the problem is, but ask for solutions and all you get is platitudes.
It could have been a Labour platform in 1997 or a Flambeau platform in 2006. But what it was, was a new political party getting launched last Sunday in Gros Islet.
If supply was an indication of demand, the plethora of independent candidates in St Lucia tells the story of a people who are sick and tired of the professional mamaguy artists in the two major political parties.
Aagee Simpson wants to run for Soufriere. Cuthbert Didier is thinking about running for the Castries Central seat. And Jerry George doesn’t even know where he wants to run, but he’s thinking about contesting as an independent.
In the run-up to the next election, independent fever is spreading. And the newest, most exciting ticket in the field of independents is Therold Prudent’s brainchild, the Lucian People’s Movement.
But isn’t the LPM just another vehicle for a disgruntled former party man who got shafted? The STAR took Prudent off his platform and put him in the crosshairs of this question.
Prudent insists that even if the current United Workers Party government had given him a post as ambassador he would have become disenchanted with them and broken away.
“The UWP has strayed from the doctrines of Sir John Compton,” Prudent told the STAR. “Even if they were to have appointed me ambassador I could not have continued to serve under a government that is so twisted.”
And in an alternate universe where Prudent was a St Lucian ambassador, what would Prudent get pissed off with the party of his youth for? The Daher Building? The failure to bring down the rate of violent crime? Asphalt and Mining? Or when government ministers, one after another, either got arrested, charged, or came under investigation for everything from traffic violations to Customs fraud?
“It would have tipped for me, after ministers of government were basically making fun of Sir John. A few of them called me during the time he was sick and what they had to say was not respectful. John Compton was my hero. He was a man I always looked up to. I was very hurt. I realized that an evil had crept on this country and I couldn’t serve in a United Workers Party administration, especially after the disrespect they showed towards a man like Sir John who had contributed so much and had come out of retirement to win an election for them that they would have never won on their own.”
About 200 people showed up for the LPM launch. Many others passed through on the way to the Green Synergy event taking place simultaneously on the Pigeon Island Causeway. Other LPM speakers, including co-chair Franklin McDonald, were victims of light heckling from a crowd that was made up mostly of independent thinkers, media people, LPM friends and supporters and disenchanted Labourites.
McDonald had little to offer the crowd.You’ve heard it so many times before, you can barely stand to listen.
“People spend more money on cars than they spend on their own health,” McDonald offered. “The health ministry of the LPM will practice preventive medicine! We will preach and preach and preach until our people get it. Preventive medicine is the way of the future. We want everyone to live as long as Sesenne Descartes if possible.”
Riveting stuff—not!
“Why should you continue with something that has already failed you?” most of them argued.
“Why should we think you are any better?” voices in the crowd answered.
Listeners were looking for something more. They wanted concrete ideas. They had been shafted by parties promising change before. 1997, anyone? No? How about 2006, then?
“This is so disorganized,” others complained. “How can a party that can’t host a good launch promise to run a country?”
But the LPM was going for the sweet spot.
There are two demographic groups that can assure a party of election victory—women and the youth. The youth are cynical. They see the worst side of politicians first and the best side never. They cannot be relied on. But women, that last bastion of hope and idealism, are the political majority. Women are the world’s last niggers, singing kumbaya day after day, making progress inch by inch. And women, unlike black people, understand that their liberation will not come on any one liberation day by a process of having one liberation day after another until there is no more liberation to be had.
“The LPM believes that the hands that prepare the supper must be seated at the table of government in this country,” McDonald promised. “Over 50 percent of the country is women and we believe that percentage should be reflected in the cabinet make up of any LPM administration. One third of cabinet ministers will either be elected or selected. If women don’t want to run, cabinet places will be made available for them. There are too many qualified women for any government not to have at least three or four female ministers.”
“Once you elect a political party to office, you have no say for the next five years,” Prudent told his audience. He had touched a nerve. The random hecklers were suddenly silent.
“We no longer will tolerate governments that have no respect for us. Leading up to the next elections, together we must decide whether we are going to elect governments that will grant us our fundamental rights to participate in government or whether we will accept the status quo of voters tossed on the garbage heap.
“We have suffered too much victimization. This old system of politics is rotten at its core. This is what the LPM is offering you. We must be prepared to reject the past to give St Lucia a fighting chance.”
It was a pitch to the cynical youth, most of whom were more interested in choosing their favourite DJ at Green Synergy than thinking about who would run the country best.
“You are the most vulnerable. Politicians take you for granted. You have to constantly flatter them. Young people must be vigilante against the old age system of politics that has  hidden agenda to screw our youths up. I was used by politicians to elect them and then they sent me out to pasture. But I tell them, this time, I’m no longer trying to assist them, I’m trying to take their jobs away.”
It was a dig at Gros Islet MP Lenard Spider Montoute. Prudent was once part of his team.
“Don’t allow politicians to use your youthfulness. “You don’t have to show loyalty to any of those parties. God gave you a brain. Make up your own mind. Take my hands and let’s bring about a peaceful revolution. The system has let you down. Let us not allow our anger to lead us to acts of disobedience. Come join us to establish a government that is focused on creating permanent employment. The LPM will not offer you the illusion of short term employment.”
You could just imagine the youth hearing, “Blah, blah, blah,” and not being able to tell whether it was Stephenson King or Kenny Anthony talking to them.
But when it came to the women, Prudent really pushed their buttons.
Flanked by the spirit of his mother Frances Prudent and the ghost of Sir John Compton, Prudent pushed to win the heart of Gros Islet.
“You want a leader that has the balls to change this country and change this society,” he addressed the better halves, bluntly. “A leader that has lived his life ethically,” flouting his credentials as a family man who does not disgrace his wife. “A leader with strong family values. “While this country has made strides, the development of women has been just too slow. We will fast track the cause of women. Too many women are trying to raise children on their own. You task has not been easy. In the LPM government you will have the opportunity to help shape policies in the interest of women.”
And then, he reeled them in.
“Under an LPM administration, when you harass your woman, you will be taken down. If you do it again, you are going in for six months. If after that you viciously brutalize her, we are throwing the keys away on you.”
Can Prudent woo the women of Gros Islet with the torch of John Compton?
Can he become the first drop in the bucket of change? Perhaps the more appropriate question is, “When will Labour wake up and see that Prudent can split Spider’s voting base?”
But that, as the boss says, is for another show.