BLP focused

Leader of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP), Mia Mottley, says she and the BLP remain focused on their mission to win the upcoming poll, so they can start the job of stabilising and then transforming Barbados.

She was speaking to the media after she was duly nominated for the seventh time as the BLP’s candidate for St. Michael North East, at the St. Matthew’s Primary School, Jackmans, St. Michael. Mottley, describing the 48 hours since the campaign’s launch as “very gratifying”, said that Barbadians will soon have another thing to look forward to from the BLP, their manifesto. While remaining mum on the details, the Party Leader said she believes that what is contained in that document, which is to be launched on Thursday, will be pleasing to Barbadians.

“This country has been hurled from crisis to crisis to crisis; none of us could ever have imagined that every institution, every sector, every group in this country has literally been hurled from crisis to crisis. It is a condition we take no delight in seeing, but it is a condition which we are intent on repairing and resolving. But not stopping there, moving on to transform the country,” she said.

Mottley added, “The truth is that the issues in this campaign are very clear, the Government will be held accountable for this crisis… and they must account to the country for the crisis whether it is a sewage, whether it is the buses, whether it is the lack of garbage collection, whether it is the hospital, whether it is the absence of materials in the primary schools, whether it is the inability for people to get jobs in the country.”

Referring also to the challenges in respect of the country’s foreign reserves, debt and the sluggishness of the productive sectors, the St. Michael North East incumbent, maintained that Barbados under the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) has been “put into a state of crisis” and the DLP Government must account to the people for their stewardship.

Mottley’s comments came hours after the ruling DLP launched its 2018 elections campaign on Sunday night in the heart of her constituency, and questioned her competence to lead this country. In respect of those criticisms, Mottley was adamant that she will not allow the DLP’s “campaign tactics” to distract her and the BLP from their mission.

“The Democratic Labour Party has not been getting people to their meetings they have no way of exciting their base and quite frankly if that’s what they think would do it for the people of Barbados for them, so be it. They are big men and women, I know it reflects more badly on them than me and therefore I stand focused and remain ready to deliver the promises to the people we know can be delivered [and] to make a difference in people’s lives. And if taking lashes from them is what it is going to take to get rid of the Democratic Labour Party, measure the back,” she contended.

She was also questioned about suggestions from DLP candidate that outside forces may be contributing to the BLP’s campaign and interfering with elective politics in this country. Mottley said, “Yhis campaign is not about who I met with; it is about what the Government is doing. Have they told you what they are doing? Have they told you where they’ve gotten their money from? Have they told you why they haven’t spent the money on collecting the garbage or buying the buses?” (JRT)