Not so!
Repeated claims that the last administration mismanaged the country and the economy is not sitting well with the man who was at the helm of the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) for eight of the 10 years they held the reins of power.
In fact, on Sunday evening while addressing a packed school hall at the Princess Margaret Secondary School, Former Prime Minister Freundel Stuart said the current administration’s constant refrain that the DLP’s term in office was a lost decade, could not be further from the truth.
In his first public address since the Party lost all 30 seats at the polls in May 2018, he said the current administration has been unable to get the country to settle down and is placing the blame on the DLP for everything. But, he suggested this administration has to get to the stage where it accepts responsibility for what is happening in Barbados, as he charged that Barbadians, despite the quest for change are not happier, and the country is “still in a state of pronounced disquiet”, which he said should be a cause of concern for the DLP.
“So we have to get back to first principles here in Barbados. I wish, I have always wished any government in Barbados well, but we have to get past spin now and PR and get down to the business of dealing with people’s problems and dealing with the cynicism, the disillusionment, the despair [and] the anger that are taking hold in this society,” Stuart charged.
His comments came as he maintained that his Cabinet was not interested in mismanaging any aspect of Barbados political or economic life.
“But, we’ve heard this thing over and over again – the lost decade, the fact that nothing happened between 2008 and 2018 and that we mismanaged the economy... I listened to it for a while, I was optimistic enough to believe that it would come to an end sometime, but that has not happened and therefore I have determined to come here this evening and confront a lot of these charges,” he said to applause from the audience.
Stuart told those gathered, included former Cabinet Ministers Adriel Brathwaite, Michael Lashley, Denis Kellman, Dr. Denis Lowe and Steven Blackett, that since the May 2018 elections, Barbadians have been given the impression that between 2008 and 2018, things happened in this country that never happened before and therefore the DLP “stands indicted”. The former PM’s comments came as he contended that his government did all it could to keep the country stable, as it faced severe external shocks like none faced by his predecessors. He spoke of oil prices in June 2018 going as high as $145 a barrel, and the price of oil staying at more than $100 for several years. He said today’s prices are “child’s play” in comparison.
“...The Democratic Labour Party between 2008 and 2018 did not have the luxury that [Errol] Barrow had, or that Tom Adams had, of that [Sir Lloyd] Sandiford hand, or that [Owen] Arthur had; we had to deal with the worse crisis that happened in the western world since the great depression and some people say for 100 years,” he said.
Continuing to defend the party’s record, he maintained that the DLP was not handed a perfect debt situation in 2008. The former St. Michael South Member of Parliament, maintained that when all the debts incurred by the former Barbados Labour Party government were brought to book under the accrual system, and the debt to GDP moved to 88 percent.
“We weren’t handed anything perfect and then we defiled it. We were handed something defiled and because of the exigencies of circumstances dealing with the worse crisis seen in a hundred years, it became a little more defiled,” he insisted.
He made the point while arguing that while his government did experience downgrades, none were as significant as when the current government came to office and chose to default on our debts.
“That is the downgrade that goes to root of Barbados’ reputation,” he contended. (JRT)