Dear Sir:
Permit me to share the following thoughts with the Dominican electorate and other readers of your valuable newspaper, on the eve of what will be the most important general elections in Dominica’s history.
It is obvious to me why Lennox Linton, Edison James, and their supporters are so desperate as to resort to all sorts of ways of [attempting] getting rid of Roosevelt Skerrit “by any means necessary” – as has been stated on the United Workers Party (UWP) political platform and elsewhere.
The fact is that they are acutely aware that they are facing another massive defeat at the December 6, polls, notwithstanding the inflated bogus poll that their strategist and former SCL operative, presented. This is evident by their persistent attempts at having the elections delayed through all sorts of devious and many times destructive tactics. They know that they have done NOTHING during the past 20 years to win the trust of Dominicans at home and in the diaspora, but have done EVERYTHING to demonstrate to the electorate that they are unworthy of being entrusted with the governance of our country.
Linton has told us in very clear language that after submitting numerous applications for jobs, no one (presumably not even his friends in the business community) would even acknowledge his applications. So, it is very evident that in his moment of reflection about his future, he realized that he faces the prospect of being unemployed for at least another five years. And that is good enough reason to drive one into committing acts of desperation.
The recent revelations appearing in the Al Jazeera documentary linking him with a diplomatic passport scandal has not helped his cause, and the Dominican electorate has another reason not to place their trust in him and his party, – hypocrisy.
Linton has been a failure as a parliamentary representative democracy. That is an undeniable fact, and the current goings-on in his constituency of Marigot is a stark reminder of his failed leadership in the community.
He has failed as a leader of the opposition and as chairman of the public accounts committee; and again, his track record in those capacities is recorded indelibly in Hansard for posterity.
Linton and his UWP are now in the throes of the death of a political party which in four and a half years in government (1995 to 2000) wrought havoc to the economy and social fabric of our society, injecting the element of unprecedented violence into our political environment.
In the succeeding years (2000 to 2019) they have made violence and confrontation the hallmarks of their political life, and have sought to destroy the image of our country even while they concealed their corruption skeletons in their leader’s “closets”.
Now the moment of truth is staring them in their frightened and confused faces, and they are reacting in the familiar manner that has defined them throughout the years of their existence as a political party – with confrontation and violence, and I should add – fake news and disinformation.
Rupert Sorhaindo
