Dear Sir
Since coming to power on July 26 2021, the Saint Lucia Labour Party (SLP) has embraced an agenda of stealth.
A low profile of public policy formulation to be announced as “putting you first ” or a kind of “trust me I love you” benevolent version of politics.
The strategy as it is emerging comprises three elements:
- First, the stabilization of the status quo, so that a new elite can accumulate wealth. New discussions with investors for government contracts and business opportunities are now channelled through new networks.
- Secondly, attempts are being made to subdue the restless youth with tantalizing promises of a “youth economy “. Opportunities to turn their hobbies into wealth-creating enterprises as if business is linear and the cycles of “boom and bust” have magically disappeared.
- Thirdly, the manipulation of those the Marxist regarded as the “lumpenproletariat”. “Destructive Individualists” emerging from the ghettos with no sense of social solidarity. The destitute, homeless, gang members, hustlers, disaffected believers, provocateurs and political mercenaries who accept every handout as the “half a loaf” that is “better than none”.
They are easily attracted to the language of “Robin Hood” or bandits posing as champions of the poor. The problem with that strategy is “crisis”.
Crisis according to Marxist theory is the big disruptor that opens up the possibility of dramatic political, social and economic change. And there is no doubt that we live in a time of “crisis” in which order cannot be sustained by a mere appeal to “self-interest”.
Thus, the SLP’s strategy is fundamentally flawed. In essence, it is nothing more than a postponement of the urgent action that is needed now, to build social and economic “solidarity” in communities across Saint Lucia – before we are forced to pick up the debris from the gathering storm.
