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It is indeed a pleasure to be here this evening to share with you the love
you obviously have for our country and to feel the pride which surely must have
spurred you on to put on this magnificent event in celebration of our country’s
twenty-fourth anniversary of independence. It is a celebration which equals any
we held at home during this past week. There may just even be a deeper intensity
of feeling at your celebrations as we all know that the heart grows fonder with
each passing day of absence from that or from whom we love. I therefore bring
you warm greetings from the Government and people of St. Lucia and our sincerest
thanks for so ably “marketing” our country in this part of the international
community. On my own behalf and on that of all St. Lucians at home, I want too,
to express deepest appreciation to the Canadian nationals and to the nationals
of all the countries that have joined us here this evening for providing St.
Lucians with the type of environment that allows them to celebrate, to laugh and
dance and so openly enjoy themselves in a land so far away from home. It is
truly an example of what we need in the world today.
For the past twenty-four years, we have been engaged in the long and often
challenging task of building ourselves a nation and fashioning us a people. In
1979, we had a vision of nationhood which went beyond mere attainment of full
responsibility for the government of our own affairs. It envisaged the full
development
of our human potential and the astute management of our resources. True, we
anticipated struggle and sacrifice, but we recognized that what we needed was
unity and discipline. We were promised that independence and sovereignty were
instruments that we could use to free ourselves from the scourges of ignorance,
poverty and disease, but we were warned that we had a choice : we could use
these instruments wisely to achieve our national goals or we could dissipate
them in foolish and unproductive strife and discord. The celebration of yet
another anniversary of this special event in the history and life of our
country, would seem to suggest that we believe that we have chosen wisely. Why
else would we celebrate ?
A significant amount of resources have been put at our disposal both in human
and financial terms, and indeed much has been achieved. Could we have done more
with what we have, had we all been willing to take personal responsibility for
the country’s successes as well as its failures ? Of course we could have. In
every anniversary message and theme the appeal goes out to all St. Lucians to
discipline ourselves to ensure that we remain on the path of continued growth
and progress. Every year we are encouraged to use our sovereignty wisely so that
we could control or shape our own destiny, to face the challenges of this and
the future world order with dignity and pride : pride in ourselves, in our
achievements as a people, pride in our country. This year, we are sounding the
same clarion call ; with a most appropriate theme : “Guarding our national pride
amidst the global tide”. There is now more than ever an urgency in the appeal
for all of us to raise the level of our national consciousness, to hold our own
in these increasingly challenging times or face the prospect of losing the
independence and the sovereignty that we worked for and earned. True, these
appeals are made primarily to those of us who have remained at home. But St.
Lucians overseas have as much a stake in our country’s survival, in whether or
not we remain a viable state.
The theme which incidentally was proposed by a member of the public reflects
both our concerns and our hopes. We are concerned about the viability of our
economy in an environment of increasing international competitiveness. We are
concerned about the effects on our economy of negotiations currently underway
simultaneously on four fronts : The World Trade Organisation, the Free Trade
Area of the Americas which stretches from Alaska to the tip of South America,
the Caricom Single Market and Economy and the Economic Partnership Agreements
between the European Union and the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of
Countries. St. Lucia is under tremendous pressure to find both the human and
financial resources to do battle on all these fronts all at once. We are
concerned that we may have reached the limit of our ability to hold our own. We
are worried about how much longer we can defend our cultural patrimony in the
face of a relentless global culture. We are worried about the escalation of
crime, about the growing drug culture. We are worried about the effects of a war
on our already battered economy. Of course, not all our troubles are externally
influenced. For my part, I am particularly concerned about our reluctance to
become personally engaged with some of the pressing issues that affect us, our
seeming inability to speak with one voice on matters of national importance, and
our persistence in seeing everything through the lens of partisan politics, no
matter how apolitical the issue.
But nations have a resilience which sometimes defies what looks like
unsurmountable challenges. So it is that St. Lucia in its twenty-fourth year of
political independence is positioning itself to take advantage of any
opportunity that presents itself in the global environment to safeguard the
gains we have made and to ensure our viability as a sovereign nation. Therein
lies the hope expressed in this year’s theme. I thought therefore that I would
share some of these initiatives with you to keep you informed, but also to
engage you in the development and implementation of some of these. It is well
known that some of our finest minds have left the confines of our shores. This
is not a bad thing at all. What we need to guard against however is the loss of
the creativity, the capability and the ingenuity of these fine minds.
Perhaps the greatest challenge facing St. Lucia today is that of remaining
competitive in this new era of trade liberalisation and world-wide economic
recession. It is this concern which prompted the establishment of the National
Economic Council, an advisory body composed of persons from the public and
private sectors and non-governmental organizations. It is in some respects a
type of think-tank for discussions on the key economic and social challenges
confronting the country, and for recommending realistic and cost effective
measures aimed at responding successfully to these challenges. It is our
expectation that a vision shared nationally would guide the process of
transforming our economy over the next two decades ; even while we realize that
the European Union has given us a deadline of 2006 to prepare for open
competition for our bananas. Our strategic priority continues to be therefore
the diversification of economic opportunities and activities to decrease our
dependency on a single sector for foreign exchange earnings. Hence the expansion
of our tourism industry into new areas like Sports Tourism, Festival Tourism and
Heritage Tourism ; the strengthening of our International Financial Services
Sector, and the diversification of our manufacturing sector.
To assist in this transformation, and to create the enabling environment through
which St. Lucia’s private sector can become more competitive internationally,
Government has been funding a Private Sector Development Programme over the last
three years. Support has been given through special tax and duty concessions to
promote development and investment in the southern and western parts of the
island, through technical assistance initiatives in the fields of product
development and human resource development among others. Other initiatives
funded both by Government and external agencies, like the Ministry of Commerce’s
Small Enterprise Development Unit, the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards, the James
Belgrave Micro Enterprise Development Fund and Canada’s CPEC - the Canadian
Programme for Economic Competitiveness – are all geared towards the generation
of St. Lucia’s sustainable economic development, growth and stability.
Another pressing challenge is the development of our social infrastructure : our
educational institutions, our health care facilities, our housing stock, our
social services, our care institutions, our correctional facilities, our leisure
and recreational facilities ; the list can go on. We speak with pride of the
achievements of the Sir Arthur Lewis Community College, but we are still working
on our goal of providing a secondary school place for every child. We speak with
pride of our two state of the art sports facilities – the Beausejour Cricket
Grounds and the National Stadium - but we are still far from reaching the goal
of providing recreational and sporting facilities in our communities nationwide.
We would have preferred to use the resources we spent on the new Bordelais
Correctional Facility in some other area, but to have ignored the serious threat
to national security which Her Majesty’s Prisons on Bridge Street posed would
have been folly. One hundred years ago the Report of the Gaol and Police
Commission found the building housing the Prisons to be unsuitable and
inadequate for its intended purposes. In spite of recent interventions in the
health care sector, we are painfully aware of the condition of Victoria and
Golden Hope Hospitals. We welcome therefore the decision to build a new general
hospital and a new Psychiatric Hospital in Coubaril, Castries. The most
vulnerable of our population – the young and the old – need to be provided for
and quickly.
But we do have a commendable profile of achievements to our credit. During the
past year, we have been particularly proud of the National Television Network
and the strides it has made in public service broadcasting ; of the National
Skills Development Centre and its provision of training and skills development
opportunities ; of the establishment of the Cultural Development Foundation ; of
the Programme for the Regularisation of Unplanned Developments which has
resulted in the transfer of land title to long-established illegal occupants of
Public Lands : and of the improvements that the Poverty Reduction Fund is making
in the quality of life of many of our rural communities.
What we are not proud of is the escalation in the crime rate, and in the
increase in the incidence of child abuse, neglect and abandonment. To reduce the
level of crime, the National Crime Commission was launched last month to form
civic partnerships with the police who have had some success in particularly
difficult areas with their community policing programmes. We can only hope that
the Commission’s theme “Crime is everybody’s business” strikes that kind of
chord in the consciousness of every peace-loving St. Lucian to motivate them to
become personally engaged in the building of a safer nation for all through
co-operation and affection for one another.
I am not sure where we went wrong, but our children, the future of our country,
feel that they are not sufficiently loved or adequately cared for by the adults
in society. This was revealed during the course of a Children’s Forum that was
convened in preparation for the Special Session on Children held at the United
Nations General Assembly in May last year. In fact, our records show that the
incidence of physical and sexual abuse, neglect and abandonment of children at
home in St. Lucia has increased four hundred percent during the past five years.
This has been attributed to the migration of mothers, the loss of the support of
the extended family, early adolescent pregnancy and unemployment. When one adds
this to the alarming rate of HIV/AIDS infection among children, (14% of the
cases recorded in St. Lucia last year were children under the age of 20) we know
that we are courting disaster. Following upon the launch of the national chapter
of the Global Movement for Children, the year 2003 has been declared by the
Government of St. Lucia as The Year of the Child. We hope to make a significant
impact on this sensitive issue.
Fellow St. Lucians, Ladies and Gentlemen, these are the concerns that have
preoccupied our minds during the course of the past year ; these have been our
successes and our failures. I have shared them with you because I strongly
believe that you all would genuinely welcome an opportunity to assist in the
development of the country that you call home – an interest that has been
recognized by the highest authorities in the Caribbean. Indeed the theme for
last year’s Conference of Governors-General and Presidents of the Caribbean
Region held in St. Vincent and the Grenadines was “The West Indian Diaspora.” We
discussed the history of West Indian migration, the economic and socio-cultural
reality of the West Indian Overseas, the opportunity and incentives for
Investment by West Indians Abroad, the part which the West Indian Diaspora can
play in retrieving our history, the economic impact of financial contributions
of Overseas West Indians to their native countries, the social and cultural
impact of returning West Indian migrants and ways in which we could tap the
resources of the West Indian Diaspora. We were guided in our discussions by such
eminent persons as the Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, the
Governor of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, the Governor of the Barbados
Central Bank, St. Vincent’s Ambassador to the United Nations, among others. Yes,
we have been talking about you, in the most positive terms, I might add. It is a
clear acknowledgement on our part of the need for us to recognize, maintain and
harness the many talents and resources of Caribbean nationals wherever they
reside. It is for us now to work out the arrangements that would allow that type
of dialogue between you and ourselves.
Perhaps I can begin by asking all of you, in your own spheres of endeavour to
engage in some intelligence – gathering and analysis on our behalf. Not the
cloak and dagger stuff or the James Bond stuff of international espionage, but
the sourcing of information on areas like educational opportunities and
institutions for example, or sharing information generated here in Canada in the
area of entrepreneurial development. The Office of Private Sector Relations
would welcome support in the area of Business Diagnoses, the development of
Business Plans and the implementation of Business Enhancement Strategies in its
programme of strengthening the private sector to make it more internationally
competitive. Or you can assist in identifying persons with specific skills not
readily available at home who could be approached for consultancies or technical
assistance. There is also scope and opportunity for joint work and joint
projects between persons resident here and organizations and institutions at
home, particularly with the work being done by non-governmental organizations
like the AIDS Action Foundation, St. Lucia Save the Children (LUSAVE), the Child
Development Centre, the St. Lucia Crisis Centre, the Marian Home for the
Elderly, the Holy Family Children’s Home, the Blind Welfare Association, the
National Council for and of Persons with Disabilities, the National Community
Foundation and others. As we say, the harvest is plentiful. The beauty of the
new communications technologies that are now at our disposal is that you can
make your contribution to the development of your native country without having
to physically return home.
I therefore invite you to consider anew how you can help build our country, how
you can help fashion us a people with the discipline and commitment not only to
survive, but to thrive in this new world order, to lay the new groundwork and
put up the new structures for a viable future for ourselves and for those who
will come after us. Let us harness all our energies, our wills, our creativity,
our generosity of spirit, our love of self, of neighbour and of country to
secure the foothold that twenty-four years of hard work has earned us. We cannot
afford to allow ourselves to be swept away by the global tide, as so much
flotsam and jetsam.
My sincerest congratulations to all of you. May God continue to shine His face
upon you, and may He guide you in all your endeavours.
Bonn fèt, bonn annivèsè. Mèsi, fwè èk sè. Thank you, my brothers and my sisters.
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