SKNLP confident on Nominations Day
TODAY IS NOMINATION DAY in St Kitts-Nevis for next month’s crucial national elections to select a government in the Leeward Islands CARICOM state.
Incumbent two-term Prime Minister, Dr Timothy Sylvester Harris of the Peoples Labour Party (PLP), squares off with his political rival, Opposition Leader, Dr Terrance Drew of the St Kitts Nevis Labour Party (SKNLP).
Drew is widely tipped to dethrone Harris who has been at the helm of the 53,000 population since 2015, after polls closed and the ballots are tallied following the August 5th elections.
Prime Minister Harris and his PLP government have been tainted by persistent scandals during his seven-year tenure.
There are questions over Harris and his Public Works and Utilities Minister’s relationship with Peter Virdee, Dieter Trutschler, and their company, PV Energy.
Scandals bourgeon under PM Harris and his seven-year-old PLP government, according to information publicly available.
Beginning in 2015 when Harris voted into office, there were the $1M Security Upgrade Scandal; the DPP Termination & Hush Money Scandal; and the Basseterre High School Scandal.
Exposed in 2016 were the Missing People’s Labour Party Campaign Funds Scandal and the Stem Cell Scandal.
Unsurprisingly, things worsened in 2017 with the exposure escalating misdeed with the Ren Baio Scandal; the Herpes Trial Vaccine Scandal (which began in 2016, but was exposed in 2017); the Cement Plant Scandal; the MRI and CT-Scan Machines Scandal; and the Lanny Davis Scandal revealed as proof that the Harris’ administration needs to be removed.
In 2018, scandals still plagued the beleaguered PLP outfit with revelations of the ‘Writemanship’ Scandal; the Marijuana Commission Hijacking Scandal and the Sexual Assault Scandal involving the Attorney General’s Chambers.
More recently, the Prime Minister has been accused of using Sate assets to buy votes ahead of next week’s general elections. According to reliable SKNLP officials although Harris is pouring millions into his campaign and allegedly in specific constituencies (2, 3 4) …local and regional poll watchers and strategists expect the national elections to highly favour the SKNLP given the political environment and Harris’s failed leadership status.”
“Tim has money and worse, the most unfit candidates to represent the Federation. Everything his campaign does is backfiring because voters have already realized that he just cannot win,” a regional pollster observed.
Dr. Denzil Douglas, who led the SKNLP in an unbroken 20-year stewardship in power, today’s Nomination Day is “looking bright and all candidates are feeling upbeat.”
“Our party is headed for an unstoppable victory at the polls. Voters in the Federation and those returning to exercise their democratic rights are fully prepared to remove Harris from office and install a stable, secure, proven and prosperity-centred administration that looks out for the common man and woman on the street,” Dr Douglas predicted.
