THE ULP IS MASSIVE AND RAMPING UP FURTHER
SERIOUS BUSINESS BEGINS
The serious business of re-electing the Unity Labour Party (ULP) government has started. All the internal party processes for the selection of the 15 candidates to carry the ULP banner in the forthcoming general elections have been successfully completed. We have used the very processes from the constituency levels right up to the National Council of the party to mobilise and energise the members and supporters of the ULP. As always, the results have been uplifting and point, overwhelmingly, to a re-election of the ULP to form the government for a sixth time in-a-row. The outpouring of support from the Labour Family has been huge. We must now “Keep the Fire Burning”; and “When we Knock on We Neighbour Door, It’s Labour, Labour!”
MASSIVE TURN-OUT AT NATIONAL COUNCIL
Last week Thursday evening, September 11th, an historic event in the life of the ULP took place at Russell’s Auditorium in Stoney Ground: The largest-ever attended National Council meeting since the founding of the ULP in 1994! Over 2,000 party members converged at the Auditorium; there was space inside for over 1,700; another 500 or so stood on the staircases and outside. The National Council mandates constitutionally 150 delegates, but the mood and strength in the party resulted in over 2000 gathered. Never in the party’s 31-year history has there been such an outpouring of members at a National Council meeting. Their energy, too, was electrifying. To be sure, the ULP members were present to approve the list of 15 unopposed candidates from the Constituency Councils and the Central Executive, and to receive the marching orders from the Comrade Leader’s speech; but they were present especially to reaffirm yet again that SVG is Labour country, that Labour is the natural party of governance; and to send the message loud and clear to the opposition New Democratic Party (NDP) that: “We Nah Turn Back”.
ULP TAKING ALL ON “THE MAINLAND” AND MORE
The mobilization and energy of the ULP’s supporters on “mainland” St. Vincent raise the realistic prospect of our party winning all thirteen seats, from North Windward to North Leeward and every constituency in-between. In the Southern Grenadines we are giving the NDP a run-for-their-money; do not be surprised if our Comrade Chevonne Stewart is in the winner’s gallery; and in the Northern Grenadines, the Canadian Lorraine Friday, temporarily resident in Bequia, is worried about his political survival.
The massive support and spirit of the National Council gathering spilled over on Saturday, September 13th at a “Red Lime” outside of Comrade Ralph’s party office in Georgetown, and on Sunday, September 14th, in Vermont at the opening of Comrade Grenville Williams’ party office. The turn-out at each of these two events over last weekend was also huge and energetic. ULP is on the move; something big is taking place.
MEANWHILE FIREMAN DELIVERS A HIT
Amidst all this political momentum, “Fireman” Hooper, the bard of soca in SVG, the mixer “par excellence” of authentic traditional musical forms and quality modernity, delivers perhaps his greatest political song ever: “Six times is plenty licks; when we knock on we neighbour door, is ‘Labour, Labour’!” It is part of the magic of the ULP to combine political momentum and creative outpourings at the same time. It is an occurrence which is well-founded in reality. Labour is the people’s voice in politics, culture, life, living, and production.
1969 – 2025: IT IS LABOUR
Since internal self-government in October 1969 to today, a span of 56 years, “Labour” (SVG Labour Party and its successor Unity Labour Party) has been in government for some 38 years (1969 to 1972; 1974 to 1984; 2001 to now, 2025), twice the time of the other side (Joshua – Mitchell “Junta”, 1972 – 74; NDP: July 1984 to March 2001). SVG is undoubtedly Labour territory; we are the natural party of governance. Almost everything of great and lasting value in SVG was accomplished by Labour governments in communion with the people, including the pivotal decision of reclaiming our independence in 1979. It is to be noted that both Ebenezer Joshua and James Mitchell opposed the move to independence. Joshua said he was opposed to independence under Milton Cato and the Labour Party; Mitchell, quite backwardly, said that there was no need for independence since we were “safe as sardines” with internal self-government in association with colonial Britain. Mitchell’s metaphor was a strange one: the only sardines that are safe are those in the tins, and they are dead!
THE VISION NOW: SVG AS A FIRST WORLD COUNTRY OF A SPECIAL TYPE
SVG under the ULP has laid a solid foundation in every material particular upon which to build “a first world nation” of a special type in our Caribbean over the next 15 or so years. We have moved SVG already to the top tier of a “high level of human development” as assessed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). We have built top class physical infrastructure such as Argyle International Airport, Canouan Jet Airport, a Modern Sea Port, Roads and Bridges galore (including the Rabacca Bridge) and so forth; we have carried out Revolutions in Education, Health, Housing, Sports and Culture; we have made SVG freer and more democratic, and have been so assessed by reputable international agencies; we have transformed and lifted the economy, increasing its Gross Domestic Product (the measurement for the growth of the economy) some four times from under $800 million in 2000 to over $3.2 billion in 2024; and correspondingly, increasing average GDP per head of population per year from under $8,000 to over $30,000; we have increased jobs from around 30,000 in 2000 to over 46,000 in 2025, while the total population has remained basically flat; we have made sure that almost all the 47,000 households (there were under 30,000 in 2000) have water, electricity, garbage collection, and modern telecommunications; We have looked after the poor, the indigent, the elderly, the women, the farmers, the fisherfolk, the working people, the middle class, local business people — everybody. We have been part of the leadership in deepening regional integration; we have advanced our foreign policy meaningfully amidst glorious successes; and so forth. We can build a “first world” nation soonest in SVG; we have the base.
TIME TO REGISTER, ORGANISE, AND VOTE FOR ULP
This is the time for the “Labour Family” to register to vote, organise to vote, and go out and vote on election day. The “Labour Family” has the duty to bring others into our big and growing family; there is space for everybody. Remember all our satisfactions and immense progress. Now is not the time to complain or grumble about this or that; it is time for victory again. The future of this country depends on a labour victory at the polls!
