Around the Caribbean many will be surprised at the continuing protestations by factions within the Cabinet of the United Workers Party of St Lucia that threaten to lead to the removal of Prime Minister Stephenson King, or cause the collapse of the UWP government altogether, and a return to the polls. For since the ructions in the St Lucia Labour Party Government of Mr Allan Louisy between 1979 and 1982, St Lucia has had a reasonable reputation for political and governmental stability, with relatively long stretches of power by both of the main parties in the country.
The United Workers Party itself, from 1964 to 1996 under the strong hand of Sir John Compton, prided itself over those years as a stable and disciplined institution, never succumbing to ‘washing its dirty linen in public.’ But St Lucians will know that, with its loss of power in 1997 under the leadership of Dr Vaughan Lewis, there has been within the party a muted contestation of whoever led the party after Compton – whether Lewis or (for a short time in 2000/2001) Dr Morella Joseph now at the Caricom Secretariat in Georgetown. This muted contestation was characterized by periodic attempts by Sir John himself to return to the leadership of the party – he held the mantle in 1998-99, then sought it again, in the period of the short-lived alliance that was being arranged to fight the 2001 general elections by Compton and the late George Odlum, who had at the time defected from the St Lucia Labour Party administration.
Compton’s persistent reach for the party leadership achieved success again in 2005, when in a bitter party convention he was again re-elected leader.
He then moved quickly to remodel the UWP once again in his own image of ‘leader dominance,’ and led it to a successful victory of eleven of the seventeen seats, against the seemingly secure Labour Party under the leadership of Dr Kenny Anthony.
Many local observers had questioned whether a Compton, resuming power at the age of nearly 82, would be able to recapture the dynamism which he had displayed for so long. He had insisted that he was still fit enough, though by the end of his first budget in April 2007, having announced his plans for a restructuring of the St Lucian economy in the face of the weakening of the banana export industry, and the way to continued growth of the St Lucian economy, it was instructive that he then announced in the Parliament, “I will take you on the road to the promised land even though I may not get there myself.”
The test, however, of Compton’s capacity to maintain his traditional dominance of his party and government, came with a cabinet decision to break diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China, and return to a resumption of diplomatic relations with Taiwan (which his government had established in 1985). Following the decision of cabinet, however, Compton appears to have had a change of heart (apparently after the exertion of pressure from various individuals in the Caribbean). His instruction to halt the Taiwan recognition process on the very day that the Taiwanese Foreign Minister had landed in St Lucia for the formal ceremony, resulted in a mutiny led, certainly in Compton’s view, by his newly appointed Foreign Minister Rufus Bousquet, who proceeded with the establishment of relations. On the next day Compton dismissed Bousquet – who as a junior Minister had been previously dismissed by the Prime Minister from UWP 1992-1997 Government for apparent insubordination.
The tenseness of the situation appears to have affected Compton’s health which many had suspected to be failing, and after some hesitation in announcing the illness which then befell him, he appointed Minister of Health Stephenson King, Chairman of the party from 1997, and a member of cabinet since 1987, as acting Prime Minister.
This act now caused another protest, this time by then Minister of Youth and Sports Lennard Montoute who, as UWP First Deputy Political, had expected that the mantle of leadership would pass to himself. It is reported that since then, Montoute has been in a constant state of agitation in pursuit of the crown, a situation which bubbled over when King was appointed Prime Minister on Compton’s death.
From that period to the present, agitation has been rife in government and party circles, as a number of other ministers asserted their right to a shot at the throne, claiming King not to be displaying the competence and vigour required of a prime minister. King, in turn, has sought to make a number of concessions to the various contestants in order to sustain his parliamentary majority. The recent resignation of Senator Ausbert D’Auvergne – indeed a response to persistent demands by Bousquet and other ministers for his removal from the prestigious post of Minister of Economic Planning, Investment and Economic Affairs – is yet one more concession to his demanding colleagues. King has now conceded, after constant refusal, to return Bousquet to the cabinet, a move which is expected to quell the storm winds against him.
In the meantime, the population, feeling itself battered by the escalation of food, petroleum and gas prices, and watching a continuing power struggle among St Lucia’s banana farmers, sickouts by members of the police force seeking the dismissal of the acting Commissioner recruited from Britain, and what is now widely perceived as indecisive government by a Prime Minister preoccupied with survival, is being petitioned by the Labour Party opposition to support its call for a return to the polls.
Time will tell whether King’s attempt at a cabinet reshuffle will bring an end to the political rumblings of the last year and a half, some degree of tranquillity in the government, and halt what is perceived by some analysts as an increasing loss of legitimacy so soon after the last general elections.
What is clear, however, is that the rigid maintenance of government and party discipline which was Sir John and the UWP’s strength for so long, has not been a part of the legacy handed down by him to his successor.
