One of the placard-bearing marchers.
ST. KITTS--Placard-bearing workers and supporters of the St. Kitts and Nevis Labour Movement took to the streets in numbers to condemn the Timothy Harris-led Team Unity Government on Monday.
Among the thousands celebrating Labour Day, observed on the first Monday in May, marchers called for an end to what they see as victimisation and the government’s politicisation of the Basseterre High School (BHS) issue; they condemned plans to build a new school on the water table, the plan to disenfranchise nationals living overseas and government’s failure to reduce crime, nepotism and corruption.
A large sign mounted on the Patsy Allers Playfield read: “Coming Soon – an end to this Government.”
Over 200 persons are claiming to have been victimised in various forms by the Timothy Harris-led Team Unity Government (TUG) over the past three years.
Opposition parliamentarians and caretakers of the St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party (SKNLP) have expressed concern over widespread victimisation of civil servants and employees of government-owned statutory corporations.
Prime Minister Dr. Timothy Harris was recently condemned for a statement that persons he has appointed to positions in the civil service and government-owned corporations based on political allegiance are expected to write glowing articles publicly praising him and his government.
The placards accused the Prime Minister of practising stark nepotism, as his sisters hold the positions of Registrar/Additional Magistrate; Magistrate; and Payroll Master in the Government’s Human Resource Department which falls under the portfolio of Dr. Harris in his capacity as Minister of Finance.
Other examples of nepotism cited are that: one of Harris’ brothers was promoted as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Development Bank of St. Kitts and Nevis and at the same time, was appointed as a director of the St. Christopher and Nevis Social Security Board which lends money to the Bank; a brother-in-law was promoted and paid thousands of dollars in back pay for a post he never performed in the Department of Environmental Health; a nephew sits as chairman of the St. Kitts-Nevis-Anguilla National Bank and is said to be involved in another company which rakes in millions of dollars; that nephew’s wife has been appointed senator and deputy speaker in the National Assembly; another nephew is paid EC $5,000 monthly as a butler in Harris’ private residence; other family members have been appointed to Boards and multi-million-dollar contracts have been awarded to the newly-established Harris Group of Companies involved in construction, car rentals, rentals of tents, tables and chairs; building and road contractors, security, heavy equipment operations, trucking and landscaping.
EC $7 million has been spent on the original BHS following the recommendations of local, regional and international organisations.
The reports from the local scientists, Dr. Milton Whittaker and Clement “Bouncing” Williams; the Trinidad-based Caribbean Public Health Agency CARPHA, the Caribbean Industrial Research Institute CARIRI, also based in Trinidad and the Washington-based National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), recommended that the buildings could be inhabited after remedial works were completed.
But the reports were rejected by the new Timothy Harris-led PLP/CCM/PAM Government and three of the wooden structures were removed from the Eastern Campus to the temporary site for use as classrooms and the Principal’s Office at a cost of EC $400,000.
The Team Unity Government also spent EC $4 million to build what they called a temporary state-of-the-art wooden structure by INNOTECH, a Barbados company, by-passing local construction companies amidst several allegations.
The United States Department of State recently highlighted government corruption in St. Kitts and Nevis, the general perception of corruption in the Police Force and self-censorship by a fearful independent media to avoid problems with the Timothy Harris-led Team Unity administration.
