 Hello and welcome to a special panel discussion in observance of St. Lucia's 42nd anniversary of independence. I am Lisa Joseph, serving as your moderator. We're looking at the topic, were you there? A look back at the fight for independence. We're looking at the political landscape in St. Lucia during the period 1979 to 1982, the desire for independence and the influence of regional political turmoil on local affairs. Despite his personal standing in Mico, however, Compton's government had barely survived the 1974 general elections. His United Workers Party had scraped through, which was to Compton, who had grown accustomed to having his way in the House, thanks to a largely unrepresented opposition, as hard to swallow as actual defeats. Months after the highly controversial elections, several charges of fraud had to be settled in court. The Labour parties, George Odlam and Peter Josie, were carrying on as if indeed they were still election candidates on the campaign trail. Hardly a day passed without a charge of corruption against Compton. One evening, Odlam and Josie led an angry demonstration to premiere Compton's official residence. Compton was not at home and his pregnant wife, scared out of her wits for her own life and the lives of her two young children, was forced to depend for protection on the unarmed policeman outside her front gates. Fortunately, armed reinforcements arrived in time to avert grievous bodily harm. When Compton talked about retirement, however, his reasons never had anything to do with his personal safety or that of his family. Once after a friend had asked him why he continued to engage Odlam and Josie in what the friend secretly suspected was a losing battle, the Premier had said, quote, Saint Usha is like a delicate little flower. A strong wind could blow us to Kingdom come, end quote. Therefore it was imperative that Compton's little flower be kept out of the hands of foolish virgins who are experts at sprouting communist mumbo jumbo and creating upheaval, but could not be trusted to do anything constructive for the island's 120,000 population. That was an excerpt from Foolish Virgins by Rick Wayne, which now leads me to introduce our guest, Rick Wayne, writer and journalist, and Peter Josie, former politician. Gentlemen, welcome. Let me just say that we will be using Foolish Virgins by Rick Wayne as much of the basis for our discussion here on this panel, and of course later on in the discussion, Shattered Dreams by Peter Josie will feature in the sort of post-independence discussion. We'll also be hearing from Sir John in his own words, a documentary that airs here on the GIS, as well as going back into the National Archives, looking at some newspaper clippings, and we've certainly seen documentary by the GIS library that will be forming the basis of our discussion. Now we, let's talk about the 1979 period, and perhaps looking at some of the issues that brought led us to 79 through the year of our independence. Let's invite first Rick, thank you so much for agreeing to participate in this panel discussion. I have read in the book Foolish Virgins, it gave me the impression that you were the fly on the wall in just about every scene in this book, and so I would like to ask, were you indeed that fly on the wall? Well, let me say first of all, this thing about the Foolish Virgins, that's a quarter. It should be told that those are not my lines, I think they're in quotes, they're Compton's lines. I suppose I was a fly on the wall, but it wasn't a fly that was kind of invisible. I was a journalist, and everybody knew that's what I was doing. I was very involved, that's the kind of journalist I am, but I was reporting primarily for newspapers. It hadn't entered my mind I was doing a book. That came much later on. So all of those things in the book were taken from stories written one day and published the next. So the pride is that all those things were there, hardly disputed to any great extent anyway. So it wasn't just a fly on the wall, it was a journalist at work. Peter Josie, thank you so much for agreeing and participating. For you, I get the sense that you are in a position at this time in your life to not just reflect on those years, but also how your actions at that time shaped the political landscape for St. Lucia. Your thoughts on that period leading up to 1979? Thank you, Lisa. I'm happy to be here, and I'm in fact even happier that Rick is here, because I've read foolish virgins a couple times, and I have to say I'm so happy that God has blessed my life to permit me to be around today when I'm writing my autobiography, because there are things that are reported here about me that needs to be corrected, because they're not exactly how it happened. I accept a lot of it is factual. In fact, I am to review my proposition right now is to review all the things that had been written about me, because for some reason I believe I was a threat in people's minds to the society. I'm not prepared to go into why they think so. They have written on those who want to read, to know, can go and look back at history. But I'm very happy to be here, and I'm even happier that I was part of everything that happened leading to the independence of St. Lucia. And later on, because we have some time, I will explain why is it, I believe, if the contribution of people like myself and Audemars and the Labour Party were followed in that time, we would have had a better constitution in St Lucia today, and maybe in a better place today. So I'm very, very happy, because I will not allow history to record and see me as some people may have wanted me to be seen, or as they recorded it, as they understood it. Might very well be innocent, an innocent observation. And it's interesting, although I'm not jealous, it's very interesting that you use foolish virgins to introduce this. When I was the candidate, I was the one who went to London all three times and request just a journalist. And I said, just a journalist, because journalists can have sides too. You see the point I'm making. But I'll not hold it against you, Lisa. I've known you long enough, so I'll let that pass. Okay. Well, thank you for not holding it against me, but this is why you are here, so that you will be able to place us there through your eyes as only you can. Trust me, I will do that. I will do that. We're going to set the scene first by hearing from the late Sir John Compton, and he speaks about a regional approach to independence. Let's go to that clip from the documentary in his own words, and then we'll be able to get some feedback. I started off with coming back from England, and a position to colonialism, and the countries must be independent. When we talk about independence in those days, we didn't speak about St. Lucia as an independent country. We spoke about St. Lucia within the Caribbean Federation. That was the big talk, Federation. Federation phase. Then we tried with the Associated States, as they call them, hoping to get them closer together. We couldn't get that. We tried the Windward Islands, and while we were negotiating the Windward Islands, that's coming into 1974. While we were negotiating for the Windward Islands to come together, and the first we start was, say, with freedom of movement, freedom to work from work permits, freedom to on land, et cetera, et cetera. While we were talking about that, Grenada went behind our backs and negotiated with the British government for independence, and they gave them the independence. Despite all the violence and all of this in Grenada, they gave them the independence. So what else? The next thing we hear, who is talking about independence, Dominica. Dominica is going independent. So what are we to do? Wait. So in 1974, we had elections in 74, which we won. Our political program was that together, if we can, alone if we must. So by 1974, it was alone because it must. So John Compton, they're speaking about that period. Past week we'll go back to Peter. Your thoughts in hearing Sir John there speak about what should have been that regional approach, that collaborative stance when it came to independence, but you found that the islands were going it alone, and so he found that Senusha too had to go it alone. And what about the thought about independence made you so opposed to it, Peter? Before we get to my opposition, it's very important when you speak, and by you, I don't mean you personally, when politicians, especially public people, speak to understand what they are living out as opposed to the words they are speaking. After federation failed, Sir Arthur Lewis, the Nobel Laureate, first Senusha Nobel Laureate, wrote a concise recommendation on a smaller federation, which he called the Little Eighth Federation, with Barbados, the windward and leeward islands. And the most important thing that happened there is before this thing had taken root, Mr. Bousquet, J.M.D. Bousquet, who was a minister in the Compton government at the time, went, was in parliament and took that paper from Sir Arthur Lewis and taught it in parliament. What did that mean? It meant that Senusha was not interested. So John Compton, well, John Compton at the time, must have known that that is what would happen. So the Little Eighth did not even have a beginning. There was no birth. Then after that, there was some talk, I mean, to pacify themselves, you know, and by themselves, I mean the government of Senusha, they made it look as if they were interested in the windward islands without Barbados. Barbados has been so far ahead economically at the time and still is in almost every aspect of life in a developing country that I did not foresee how these windward and leeward islands could function and survive without having Barbados included. Plus, Barbados was the favorite island of all the developed countries, including the British, the policemen, civil servants, all the key things, all the ambassadorial things that after independence up to today, the regional security system, almost everything is based in Barbados. What do you think would have been behind that before Rick Chan's in? I guess they probably knew that maybe Grenada wanted to go alone because it's a small region. Gary was fairly popular, but there was a lot of machinations going on. There were a lot of influential rich people behind Gary, a lot of millionaires, I guess they wanted Grenada for themselves. So when Barbados failed or maybe they thought Barbados was too far ahead of them and too disciplined and too correct, so they preferred the windward islands. Hopefully, I don't know if that was the thing and maybe Saint Lucia thought it was in a better position to be the capital of the windward and leeward islands. All of this could have come in the reckoning. Rick? Interestingly, I wish I'd brought it. So Arthur Lewis goes into detail as to why the Federation failed and what he hoped would happen. He also said that the islands would come together, the region would come together, but only after the passing of the then prime ministers or premiers or whatever. Of course, that still hasn't happened. Compton also seemed to have had a concern that he called shocks and sardines and Saint Lucia. Sardines didn't swim with shocks. That was a Compton attitude. But what I find especially, because this is a little before my time journalistically, what I find interesting, bearing in mind what happened later on and Compton's expressions later on, because he did finally say independence was a misnomer. He said so at the central library that Britain could hardly wait to cut us off, that Britain had carried us out of the colony, that Britain had gone through associated statehood all in preparation for Britain cutting us off. So it wasn't really independence. So it's a very interesting situation where you had one side speaking against the independence, all that surrounded it, and the other side, pro-independence, where in fact there was no independence. In reality, it was Britain deciding I've had enough of feeding those sardines, let them go swim on their own. So it's a little bit, not disturbing, but interesting to me to hear John Compton saying in that clip that about the possibility of independence amass. I don't know how he could even talk about that. Where would the control be? He could only speak for Saint Lucia, and from negotiations with others, maybe they would agree to that, but that had nothing to do with him. In any event, it's cancelled out by his final statement that there really was no independence on the table, that it was cutting you off, children you've grown up now who fed you enough, go take care of yourself. But if that's the case, Peter, and I saw you nodding as Rick was speaking, so you too understood that Britain was ready to sort of quote unquote dispose of Saint Lucia after having carried it for so long. So what was the crux of your opposition and members of the Saint Lucia Forum? What was the crux of that opposition? It was very simple. We thought, and I've said so in my opening statement, I still believe that independence is about the constitution that you have to guide you. This is the key factor, and that the people of Saint Lucia, although people said otherwise, in the 1974 elections, were not consulted, we are talking now from what you said between 79 and 82. Really, and I think you understand that as well, it started from 74, because it was after the 74 elections and in 1977, in fact from 1966, the Compton administration had written to the British government, so seeking independence. But Rick is also right. The United Nations had a group of 24 that were demanding independence for all colonies everywhere in the world. And I don't believe that group of 24 came about without the nod of people like England and France and those countries that had a lot of colonies. So it was a plot. It was a plot. To get rid of all those islands, they had become baggage. And so we needed to get rid of all these islands. And the group of 24, the United Nations, was a very convenient tool for both the developed mother colony, quote, unquote, mother is in quotes, and the colonial territory itself to say, ah, this is our moment. England, you have to give us independence. You have to give us independence. That is what the international people want. St. Lucia, you have to be ready. Ready or not, independence is coming. And we in the opposition at the time, in fact, from forum, we are talking about independence because we felt that we couldn't take this country anywhere, either alone or as a group if they were not independent. So there are people who try to say otherwise, but the facts are there. So you were pro-independence. Even before Compton had mentioned it from the forum, but they were afraid that what we are talking about, if we became independent, and that is a term I love to use up to now, we had to militarize the society for young people to have military discipline. What does that mean? Because, well, because reading, reading through foolish virgins, there was a lot of apprehension about that sort of military presence in St. Lucia. That's why I mentioned it again today. You cannot develop a country without your youth being trained to defend the country, to work for the country. When you reach from five, either sixteen, seventeen, whatever age, you should be registered as a voluntary youth worker for the country. On Saturdays, when you have three times, you begin, or your name is registered everywhere in the government service. You would admit, though, Peter, that at the time, looking at the time period that we were in, and given all that was taken place. Given Fidel Castro and Cuba. And Cuba and Grenada, the events happening in Grenada as well, that when you speak about whether the military, military discipline, the signing up of youngsters, people immediately associated that with colonialism. Yeah, but why? Why? They have not read the history of America to know how America was transformed. What is the name of that President Rick, who began the work thing in the United States when they had the depression? Even President Kennedy, JFK, what did he do? The young Americans were graduating. What did he do? He started the Peace Corps movement where young Americans were trained and were working all over the world voluntarily. Let's get Rick to chime in here because Peter is speaking about that time. I saw you nodding. And as I was saying to him, the idea of that military discipline that he's speaking of, did St. Lucia at the time, because Peter is very firm in his mind that yes, they were for the info independence, they had a particular method that they wanted to apply to St. Lucia. Was St. Lucia's very, how should I put it, were they, quote unquote, okay with what it is that the St. Lucia Forum was pushing at the time, Rick? Let me say this. We're talking about independence. We're talking about an independence that was not an independence. It was, that was fake. It was put by both sides to the people and both sides gave their promoting points. You know, if the Labor Party or whatever the group was, Peter and so on, were against whatever Compton was talking about in terms of independence. The matter of communism, that never worked. There were never any communisms in Lucia. The guy's communism was a bogie man. And so for election purposes, from the days of Peter Georgians on George in the Forum, were called communists. It didn't take any, it didn't require any explaining. People were not interested in explanation. There was nothing about militarizing anything. Communism was the devil. And so Compton presented, painted those guys as the devil who were against independence. But again, the people took it in the neck because there really was no independence on the table. It was a cutting away, a cutting of load, of baggage. So the reality, as now, was seldom ever discussed on the road to independence. The independence itself became a political football. One side was against it, so they said whatever they needed to say and do against it. Just like now. But independence was the day's DSA, I suppose. Independence was never really on the table. The people worked on it. And Compton admitted that later on. But I have to say George Peter and them also called the people because they didn't tell them they're not even independence here. Britain wants to cut us off. Whether we liked it or not, Rick, the point is that a group of 24 other United Nations had mandated the thing we call independence. So we had to play along, whether it was fakery or not. It's not material. It was not material at the time. Because if we did not go, then England would give John Compton and Henry Girodi who went with him and Perry husbands. These were the three guys. Perry was the attorney general. Henry was chairman of the UWP. They would have gotten all what they wanted in the Constitution without an input from the opposition. You see the point I'm making? Once you were in England, Peter, did you find that you had, you and your other members, had a firm input into what the Constitution would turn out to be? I would say on some of the some of the crosses in the Constitution, like the preamble especially, but the British were all up to it. Although I have to tell you those areas that we in the opposition were particularly interested in, like term limits for the Prime Minister. You're watching Were You There? A look back at the fight for independence. Stay with us. Do you know we can limit the spread of the COVID-19 virus? The Ministry of Health is your partner in achieving this solution. Introducing the AMBER wristwatch. The AMBER wristwatch is designed for monitoring daily movements while in quarantine. It provides an accurate location and a precise heart rate. The device is also waterproof and can be worn during all daily functions like washing the dishes or taking a shower. It's worn like a typical timepiece. The Ministry of Health can now better monitor people in home quarantine and receive alerts of those who do not stay in the confines of their home. A 14-day rental of the AMBER wristwatch is just 75 US dollars. Let us stop the breaches of home quarantine. And welcome back to our special discussion Were You There? A look back at the fight for independence. Before we went to break Rick, you were chiming in on what Peter left us off on. Now to take on some of what Peter was saying there. Also again, we're talking about something that has never existed, that had no existence or still has no existence and it really is something of a past in all ways. Why is it that after all this time of quote-unquote independence we still have done nothing, no serious discussion, no referendum about term limits? What is stopping us in all those years in 79 if we were so interested in term limits during the discussions in London and so on? Why has that never been approached in any serious way here? The independence. All the things that Peter just talked about that they might have wanted in the Constitution or whatever. We have had ample time to have done that and Peter has been in government. Compton was in government and all those things. And we are to finally more than ever dependent on the the charity of strangers. We're more than ever dependent to bring it up. Vaccine. We're dead without strangers helping us out with that. This whole thing about the Prime Minister said about colonization. We're dead without that without colonials. We are as dependent on England and the United States as ever we were. And there are people old enough in the country to even suggest that we were better off under the colonials. The myth of we were free. And Compton you talk about as well, free to solve, free to not work, free to be a bomb. Freedom is supposed to open up, give you all the liberty to pursue the stars, to pursue greatness. We've not done that to my mind and I think it's such a fantastic opportunity to say we have regressed in all the important areas we've regressed. And our minds have been filled today not with communism, but with racist notions, even though we cannot survive without the great assistance of the very people against whom we want to practice our, if only, mental racism. Let's go to the scene of London because before we took the break, tell Peter we'll get a chance first to expand on that. And I'll excerpt again from Foolish Virgins. Sorry, Peter. Yes, okay. At a special meeting in London, opposition leader Alan Luise had argued for a definite postponement of Compton's independence plans to no avail, plagued by his own social and economic wars. The British government seemed to have heirs only for St. Lucia's premiere, who was soon crowing on local television and over government controlled radio that come February 22nd in 1979. St. Lucia would be an independent nation with its very own place at the United Nations General Assembly. Free at last in retaliation, George Odlam issued a public warning that come Independence Day, St. Lucia might not be the safest place in the world. Peter, your recollections? Because if we're saying that there was no independence to gain, there was the argument for the postponement of that independence, which in effect we have said was a farce. Because they were pretending there was independence. Let me take it from where Rick left off because sometimes the facts are looking at you in the face and it is so obvious that the only people who will not see it are those who do not want to see. The colonial office, and Rick is correct, there was independence but at the same time they didn't free the islands completely. That's one aspect. But the people of St. Lucia themselves were not prepared to be free because they were simply not prepared by their leaders. What does that mean? Explain that to us. People did not understand independence. They were frightened, as you pointed out earlier, that Peter Josie was talking one thing about to have the right rectitude, to have young people walking straight. But it is a kind of almost a joke because what about getting the discipline of a serious country? What about it? What about the word militarization that frightens people? That you're afraid of 42 years after independence? What about it? Perhaps Rick can help us in there. Rick, what about that frighten the St. Lucia back then and as he's saying, so frightens us now. What I want to be careful about is if we are discussing the road to independence, I think we should deal with that. And then having achieved independence, what we did, we have to be very careful don't stray too far. I'm not there against discipline, taught from school and at home. But that is about the smallest thing. If in fact you are pretending that you are independent, already you're fooling yourself, you're fooling the people. And like I said, finally John Compton said that was a misnomer, that it was just, and in reality, and don't forget before the independence thing, there was elections on the table. There was elections on the table. It was an election football. So all the matter of the people was ready, whatever I said. Britain has been warning us from the very beginning that the status we held was not going to be forever. And the main reason was Britain had its own money problems, its own economic problems, all social problems, and could no longer, maybe because that blood is dry anyway, it could no longer be carrying us in our backs. That is the issue. So even now we are celebrating independence. To be independent, Lisa, you've got to be economically independent. That's the number one thing. You have to have people with a notion of what independence is all about. We have neither. And the people have been kept at each other's throats as an instrument by which to get into office. Independence has nothing to do with those things, nothing at all. So we continue to celebrate independence, where in fact we should be celebrating, I don't know if it's worth it, our disconnect from the colonial office insofar as we're disconnected. I can't help thinking that the whole thing has been a joke perpetuated by politicians over the years to get into office or for whatever other reason. That's why I have a big difficulty moving away from my point that independence, as we think it, never existed, never was on the cards, and that content ultimately admitted the people had been called. But let's assume that they were serious rick. And one of the things Compton also said in his paper, I would add, is that independence would allow us as a country to choose who our friends were. But even that is suspect because it seems to me that the only friends St. Lucia can choose in the eyes of her former bosses are people who think like the way the bosses think. And I'm referring specifically now to Cuba, which is an island in the Caribbean that has helped us far beyond her own capabilities. Training St. Lucia's given St. Lucia's scholarship when this virus broke out, Cuban doctors and nurses came to help us. And yet it seems for some people, we are not to say that, we are not to mention Cuba. And one of the things I repeat that John Compton, he died, knighted, said was that we would be free to choose our friends. But I think largely we've been very embracing of Cuba and all that it has done for us. But I want to ask a little clarification from you, Peter, from the excerpt there from Foolish Virgins. John Odom issuing this public warning that come independence day, St. Lucia might not be the safest place in the world. What do you think he meant by that? Let me make a confession to you that I believe only Rick in St. Lucia knows. I was going to suggest that this is an unfair question to Peter. No, let me answer it. I am going to suggest that only Rick can answer, understand what I will say. And I will say it for St. Lucia to finally understand. George Orlam and I were very close political allies. Some people even call us political twins. But I want to say to you, the viewers and everybody who can hear me and see me, that 90% of the things George did, I knew nothing about. When he went to radio, I said, Lucia with Farley and whoever, I was nowhere around. When the Boulevard thing was happening, I remember Rick was in George's office. I'm so happy he's there because he was more than a fly on the wall. He was there at George's office with Farley and one or two others. When Compton applied for permission to have a public meeting on the Boulevard and Luisi asked George whether he should do it. So George is consulting. I said, George, during the elections, Compton could not have a meeting on the Boulevard. And you are telling Luisi that he should give him permission? I said, that will be chaos. They'll break down the place. We are the government now. Rick is there. Rick is my witness. I'm so happy you're here, Rick. These are things I had to take off my chest a long time ago. So you had an inner understanding of what George meant by this. Rick knew everything. What Peter just said there, I'm thinking about the time we have and really this is the first time you're hearing a reality about the 7982, which I think of as our 9-11. When you say 9-11, you don't have to say anymore. 7982, you don't have to say anymore to a certain age. Peter is absolutely correct that a lot of the things that George is quoted as saying, Peter was nowhere around. And a lot of the things that Peter and George are connected with, Peter was totally disconnected. But to answer your question, that was just days before independence and Martin Bell from the BBC and other reporters from all over the world really came to cover that. And it was a particular interest to them because by that time, there was that whole Louisie faction. There was that whole George Adlon faction, if I'm correct on that, yeah. Yeah, it's going on. And Martin Bell actually, the times in London didn't give the Labour Party a chance of winning the election because of course Compton was the boy and all of this was wrapped up in politics. All of that was wrapped up in politics. So he's correct. The statement George made to me was at a time when Martin Bell was around filming everything, George, Wengson wrote a calypso about Martin Bell, the BBC. Still around, I think. So he wouldn't know anything about that. But George did say that. I should also correct Peter on something there. The particular meeting he referred to, which I don't think was independent, that was just shortly before the bus stop in the Boulevard, the night before the evening of the bus. Kenny Antony, Winston Spring of the Elder, myself, and a couple other that I don't remember now, Kenny was trying to persuade George to cancel the permit for the meeting because there was obviously trouble. And George had stirred some of that trouble by a broadcast earlier in the day. Peter Josie gets a lot of blows for that. Peter Josie had nothing to do. I want to put in the record. I said it before. Nothing to do with that. Peter walked in while the discussion was going on, the hopeless discussion was going on. He walked in with a guy from Dominica called Atherton, I forget his first name. They walked in, they were talking, they moved around George's ministry and left. Willie James later on, writing in something called the tumult, he wrote and it was very funny, written, because he started off by saying George was a good guy, he went to Oxford, he was a classy guy, he was a gentleman, all those things. Therefore it had to be Peter Josie who was behind the whole thing in the boulevard. Let me put it in the record, nothing could be further from the truth, and it's a burden that Peter has carried and yet he doesn't deserve at all. That's the cross. Call it my cross. That's the cross I've carried so far. Yeah, so far. So going back to your question about the statement, he would know nothing about that, but I was there and I report. And by the way, remember that when those books came out, George was around to dispute and did not. Atherton Martin was a progressive guy from Dominica, he was not in elections per se, but he was of the Morris Bishop Peter Josie kind of thinking. Let's go to another clip there of Sir John as he speaks on going to independence and the opposition he faced from his perspective. Before I went to the, we went to the party, we had a convention, party convention in Meekoo in 75 or 76. We had a party convention, we decided we are going into independence. We got a resolution passed in the party, we went to the parliament and presented the resolution in the parliament, of course it was opposed then, and we then approached the British government to start negotiation for independence. We had this problem. We had a British government representative who had been in Botswana, that's in Southern Africa, near to South Africa. And he was as racist and apartheid as they come. To him, black people shouldn't govern themselves. They can't govern themselves. Look what's happening in South Africa, look what's happening in Nigeria, look what's happening in Ghana, all this confusion. Now, so he became the ally or the Labour Party, use him as their ally. And every time they made a meeting and keep noise and make a demonstration, he would send it up to the to the British and say, you know, is it going to be bloodshed in St Lucia, is it going to be this in St Lucia? And he delayed us to no end. We went, we went first, they said, fine, you go back and show that the people really want it. Issue a white paper and discuss it all over the country. We did that. We went back, tell us another story. Until 1978, we went to the constitutional conference. So John, they're looking at the opposition he faced going to independence. Rick, you had a chuckle. Well, I have a chuckle because the perpetuation of the myth is a lot was going on there. When he knew, no matter what he did, he was going to be cut off. I think we don't agree that the plan was to cut off these leeches. So all of that is almost irrelevant. And we've, as time went on, there's a guy called Paul Thoreau, a writer, and he says, the torch of time illuminates the darkest corners, the things that seem so dark and mysterious, and give it time, and we'll see how clear it is. When you listen to John Compton talking there, and over the years, the things that have evolved and the truth sort of come out and the discussions that have been held, what the heck is that, Botswana and Black people not controlling themselves, et cetera, et cetera, Britain was cutting us off. And the whole thing is based on a false premise. And my concern right now is for people to understand that we were cut off, that we got political independence to do what the heck we wanted. What did that mean? I don't even know what that means. It means we could have total limits or not. It means we could ignore the Constitution as we please. This is what I particularly am very interested in discussing. The idea, I'm convinced that independence was a nice, for the moment, ploy, an election football. The conservative people would buy John Compton's story. The more radical, and I say radical, mainly in terms of following George and Peter Josie. Not that they had any beliefs either. So you followed Peter and George and so on. The younger people did that. But the more conservative kind of went for that. But both were calm. It's not too late, if I may add, Rick, on this. It's not too late in my humble opinion for solutions to ask themselves, what was on this white paper that the British asked John Compton to prepare? Why did they ask him? The thing about Botswana and black people is total throwaway and completely relevant to what we are talking about. Perhaps we need to focus, as Rick said, on what the British wanted the government to prepare the white paper for. What was the reason? Why was it asked to do that? We've never had economic independence. In fact, we have always been broke-ups. I've always said these countries really are close to failed states and have been for the longest while. We don't have the human resource relevant to our times. We have never had the money and we have never had natural resources like gold and all that kind of. We've never had that. So what is it we wanted to do? What do we want? Freedom to borrow money without going to the colonial office? Freedom not to account to the colonial office? This is what we should be discussing. And where do we go from here? Having now a straighter, more realistic idea of what was perpetuated under the name of independence. So even though we are at this time celebrating and marking quote-unquote independence, that does not mean we can't face some inconvenient truths. Because if you're playing games of shadows, that's what you'll be doing all the way. And no wonder we haven't moved. But Sir John is on record as saying that for him the independence was really important to allow to give the power to the people because the legislative council that existed before gave none of that to the people. So for him it was important for the people to be able to take ownership of what it is that they wanted to go for. But I would throw back a question at the questioner. I don't think anybody in St. Lucia believes the average person has any power. They think the power resides in the guise of on the government side. Because we really, power is the funny, what power to do what? It's like come to celebrate the freedom and I agree with him on that. Freedom has to mean more than the freedom to lie around or not go to work on the freedom to rob people and the freedom to beg and all that. It has to mean a little more than that. Somebody said freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose. That's what I was thinking about as a Chris Christofferson song. I am concerned that the people have been laboring, no point intended, under a misconception since 1979 and if you're driving a car that does not exist, you're not going to move. If a car only exists in your mind, you're not going to move. The truth must be faced and it doesn't mean that everything I say is the pristine truth. I say it and throw it out there for further discussion. Peter was a very much a part of this so he can always say. I notice that you have not touched on what really went on in St. Lucia on the Rocky Road to Independence because there was a lot of trouble. St. Lucia suffered a lot of trouble on that mythological notion of independence. So don't forget me. Be coming to right there to that point after this break. We'll take a short break and we'll be back. We must protect each other if we are to beat this corona. For further information, please contact the hotline at 311 or the Bureau of Health Education at 468-5349. And welcome back to our special discussion in studio here. In observance of St. Lucia's 42nd anniversary of independence in studio with me is Rick Wayne, no stranger to the St. Lucia population as well as Peter Josie. And so we're discussing were you there? Look at the fight of St. Lucia's independence. We want to go to another clip of Sir John. We set that up and then we come back. We continue the conversation. The Constitutional Conference in London and we agreed that we should, we'd have our independence. We even set the date to the 13th of December. That was the date for independence. But the Labour Party at the time, they wanted elections before independence. And that has never happened. Jamaica got it without elections. Trinidad got it. Guyana got it. Grenada got it. Nobody ever, that was never imposed as a condition on any one of them. But it is sort to impose it as a condition to us. And the Labour Party objected, demonstrated they did all these things. Now what had happened in the Caribbean? There was a lot of turmoil. There was Grenada, there was Cuba, there was all of this thing. And they exploited that. They created a lot of confusion. There was coming to independence besides the demonstrations and whatever it is. Coming to independence, they are, they fermented strikes in the public services. Teachers strike, civil service strike, this strike, that strike. And trying to postpone it, trying to impede it. Of course, the thing had passed to the British Parliament. There's nothing they could do to stop it. What they did was to impede the celebrations of it. So John, they're really setting that stage there. And Ricky, you were talking about a lot of the turmoil that was happening on the ground. And so we get into that. But before I get that, what happened, Peter, to the December 13, 1979 dates? You remember earlier, you mentioned that Alan Louisi, who was the leader of the opposition, had asked for a postponement of the date of elections. For independence. For independence, sorry. This was never about John Compton or the UWP. Independence was for the people of St. Lucia. And who made the decision that it should be on the 13th of December? So the date, February 22, 1979, did you and your members have a role to play in that? Did you agree upon this date since December 13, 1978? No, it was a compromise. It was a compromise date. What we wanted was to have elections. And as a compromise, they gave that date. But the real compromise, the British thought they did at the time. And we bought it. And I say we as the Labour Party, was that there would be elections within six months of independence. Why was that so important, Peter? It is important because we want to know, you can only test how people really feel. You can only test how people really feel. And in those elections in 79, the Labour Party won a two-thirds majority. You can then argue whatever happened to that afterwards, maybe is relevant. But the point about it is that the people, and we talk about the people, the people, the people, they gave the Labour Party a two-thirds majority. So the constitution could have been amended. As usual, people were too busy about their own personal agendas at the time. And I say no more on this because people were not around to answer. So we'll go to break. Because you spoke about the turmoil that came on the road to independence and all there was. And we saw in the clip in there, in the newspaper clipings, the strikes with the civil servants, the teachers. But certainly it's ironic, I think, to my own mind, because Sir John, in his foyer into the politics here, had led a six-week strike of the sugar-keen farmers. And so for him to have had to deal with that in government, I thought was really an irony there. Speak to us about that era. Having the teachers were out really for more than a month on strike and the civil service as well. If you listen to what Sir John... Well, John Compton at the time, not Sir, so we can... When I say Sir, if you listen to what Sir John is saying there, he's not saying. If you listen to what he's not saying, because he's saying it, even though he's not saying it, you detect an election campaign. He's in the middle of an election campaign. If you look at the headlines that accompanied the clip, you just should there. Those were election mood headlines. So Compton did not want an election, because he wasn't comfortable with the mood of the day. The mood of the day had been changed radically by Peter Josie and George Orlon primarily. Whatever way you want to look at it, people did feel empowered, perhaps in the worst way. Perhaps the people didn't quite understand what it is to have power. It was mainly a rebellion. It was almost a rebellion in what had been there before. Because, yes, there was a very class-conscious Saint Lucia at the time, very class-conscious. There were a certain group of people who were elite. And, matter of fact, I have some wars with their offspring right now, because I tell them, I remind them of that time, and I tell them they come across now as if they came from Toulouche. So I've had my wars with them for a long time. So what there was was, I would prefer to use what Peter and George primarily had stirred up, was a rebellion against the status quo. And that rebellion also included a rebellion of whatever Alan-Louisie stood for, because Alan-Louisie was made more of the stuff of John Compton. In fact, we don't have enough time because Alan-Louisie's main advisor for quite a while in government was John Compton. I know I was supposed to be an assistant at the time. So that kind of stuff was going on. So Peter, Josie, and George primarily had created an atmosphere of rebellion. I don't want to say empowered because there's no power involved in that. And that is what Compton is referring to about the diss and that. Now, if you want to go into the details, and not necessarily, but there was a lot of chaos in the country. I once said to both Peter and George on a show that I figured they also introduced books about that period. A number of things that they did were involved in that on reflection looks mad, but may well have been the only way to bring about the change. And that those very things have no place right now in the country, because we can't be more in control of things happening here. And what we're in danger of doing is destroying ourselves to show that we can. We have so misunderstood power that we are turning our own guns on ourselves right now. At the time, Peter, Josie, and I had my moods and my times and my feelings and disagreements with them or with them at another time, depending on, I'm still the same, I guess. Think of it as a rebellion against the status quo, and that the status quo was basically elitist. So it wasn't that difficult for those guys, and Peter, Josie, and George are in their heyday or firebrands. The reason Peter and George got so close together, that's what Peter had to talk about, and how close in fact they were. I refer to them in my book very good morning as the odd lemon Josie monster, because what you saw was a melding of these two guys, and Peter seeming the more radical. Is that true, Peter? Let's get Peter. Peter, did you think, do you believe that you were? I said seeming, huh? Seemingly the more radical of the two of you. People said what they want about me, I've never questioned them, so I leave that to them. All I'm prepared to do is to give the facts, and I spoke only from my heart. I never spoke the politics as politicians do, and I just want to say one more, to add something to what Rick said. I said recently on the radio station, maybe about a month ago or less, that when I got on the forum platform, and in September or thereabouts, the darkest person at Barclays Bank was Hollis Bristol. That was the remnants of the colonial system, and one of the things George and I did with the help of people like Mikey Pilgrim and others was when we got into office to begin to start to establish the Bank of St. Lucia, which was the national, started as a national commercial bank. I want to make that point, because we used to talk about commanding the highest point of our economic resources, which is our money. I know there was the cooperative bank, which is now the first national bank, but we were determined to establish our own bank, and today it is the biggest bank, the biggest local bank in the OECS. So I want to say that, to emphasize it, because writing it in a book is not sufficient. I've written that. I want to say it. This is the kind of contribution, and the people like the name I just mentioned, and people of that complexion, I used to just group all of them as the remnants, the word remnants of the colonial system, because there was a hierarchy based on pigmentation. The color of your skin meant so much in those days, and I know it kept a lot of black and dark skinned people back. If you were fair, and as my parents, and not my parents, so much my grandparents used to say, and it's a phrase I've used recently, and some people try to ridicule and papi show it and talk in nonsense, St. Lucia's lover Kule YII up to now, because they know that if you had that little Kule YII, like the requins and people like that, you could get away, you could get a little pass. You understand what I'm saying? But these are the complexities of our colonial times. Then Peter has just raised the point I made, if I dare say, the very important point I made, that having gotten the power of, at least on the paper, they then turned on themselves and destroyed themselves. That's why you had the Louisie thing, the power struggle, and again Peter got a lot of blows on that too unfairly. I want to add that again. Thank you, Rick. I don't know if you have time, but Peter has taken a lot of blows for that one in particular. I'm glad you're clearing your conscience. No, I've also, but it underscores what I'm saying, that when you have a rebellion that you pretend is an empowerment. The revolution turns on itself. And you don't educate that crowd. It happened in Grenada too by the way, I don't want to go into that. Well, we're coming to Grenada, but just to expand on what Peter was saying here on the establishment of the National Commercial Bank and the Senusia Development Bank, and also abolishing user fees and health facilities, that happened under Sir Alan Louisie, just a little fact there when they came into government. And it would not have happened without Peter, Josie, and Jeff Audlum. That's the point I'm trying to make. It would not have happened without myself and George Audlum supporting Alan Louisie. So the question then is, what happened after that? Yeah, so what happened after that? The power went into some of my friends, but I must say categorically. And Alan Louisie was forced to resign. Yeah, I never was ambitious enough to be Prime Minister because I was afraid of it. If I was Prime Minister, it would enter my head to do things that the people were not ready for. So I thank God every day, and I've never been a person after power like the average politician. My power is to see people grow and develop from poverty, being ambitious, working hard, trying to save, send your children to school because your generation, if you never went to school, might not be the one to come back and build a house for you. The one that is at school now at university, this is the one you have to look forward to, continue to support them. That has always been my kind of mantra and approach to how we evolve and develop as a people. Revolution was in the wind. The presumed happy-go-lucky, tourist brochure people of the Caribbean have begun to grumble and rebel against Whitehall-oriented governments, such as Premier John Compton's. While the new breed of politician was concerned, Fidel Castro was God. Cuba, heaven and socialism, the road to salvation, Compton fought back. He offered St. Lucian's the desperate promise that the solution to their problems was synonymous with independence from Britain. Though that was the thought for Sir John, we had the Grenada-Cuba effect, eminent revolution in the region from Grenada, and the effects of that in our local politics. Take us to that time period. What was that like? Because again, we're going through your book, give the sense that there was the notion to a very wary about what was taking place in Grenada and the sorts of love affair that John Odlam seemed to have had with Grenada and George, George Odlam had with Grenada. You know, I laugh at it because again, another pass, another fig tree, another joke that people have paid at the end of the day, just to encapsulate quickly, there was the Grenada, quote unquote, revolution. You know, the only people who really talk about the Grenada revolution? They are the people who are close to it, who are part of it, et cetera. Almost every other writer either makes, if Naipaul is one, of course, but Naipaul covers the burden. They will say he was a resistance and everything else. But almost every writer, except somebody like Sir, one or two others. But the idea that there was a revolution, what is like the most people, was a copycat situation. Morris Bishop was genuine. Morris Bishop came to St. Lucia and I don't think anybody who met him was not impressed with it. Peter was there, I have pictures of the guys together. Morris Bishop had ambition, but like St. Lucia, the revolution turned on itself in Grenada and they destroyed themselves, the lives were lost and Grenada is back to whatever Grenada has always been. When we rebel in St. Lucia and break down everything, et cetera, two days later, St. Lucia is still St. Lucia, none the richer. People are not better off. We don't have anything to pull from this one and give that one. There's not even a redistribution of wealth situation in the country, possibility in the country. Some countries that rebel and have coups and all that kind of stuff, they are rich countries and the effort is to redistribute wealth and make things more even. St. Lucia doesn't have wealth for redistribution. So you wonder why we want a revolution rather than to use the system we have, use it properly and make sure everybody is entitled to it. Because we have the means, that's what we went independent for. We have the means. Look at when we tried to modify the constitution. It just thrown out. One of the main things, the main recommendation was that the Prime Minister was seen generally as having too much power and they wanted buffers between the Prime Minister's power and so on and so on. The Labour Party's side when taught, in fact the main reason Kenya Anthony gave for dumping or putting it aside was that the recommendations were too obsessed with the power of the Prime Minister. But finally, both in Grenada and St. Lucia, if you want to call what happened in 79 and so on as something of a revolution, it wasn't, it was just unrest. St. Lucia's paid. Only St. Lucia's paid. Business paid. Tourism paid. In Grenada, only Grenadians paid and then returned to the huts. And then returned to the huts. It's like a home, a husband and wife fighting the hell. You cripple a husband but you decide you're not going anywhere and you saw you now have a crippled husband in your house. This is what these unrest and revolutions total to in our region, Lisa. And then we give people glazed over, whitewashed versions of what happened there. Like I was talking to somebody, Sir John talking there. If you listen and if you know what he's talking about, enough about St. Lucia on your own, you know he was talking about elections. And you know he was worried that the Labour Party would win the elections. And he was hoping that independence would give him the safe road away from elections. Of course those guys, Peter and those guys had things too cornered, 79. Interestingly, George Adam didn't win that election, did he? No. Interestingly, George Adam, the main man, he did not win. He couldn't beat Maroc. 74. 74. 74. But that's 74, yeah. What you would have thought he would have. You would have thought he would have even then. He didn't. And then Bayer County was saying that perhaps what he had done, he had not understood the election machinery as he should have. Compton was very worried about the election result. And ironically, when the Labour Party then came in having won the election, it was the Labour Party that went to sign on the documents and make the speeches. George, I happened to be there recording it, taking notes and interviewing and seeing for myself everything. That's why I'm in a position to write my views on what transpired. And very little of it has been disputed. But on reflection, because I too was caught up in the thing. I thought it was a wonderful thing. We're now at the UN. It has meant nothing. At the bottom of it all, all these things were nothing more than flashes. Flashes. It's pathetic when you think about it. But it's also, Rick, that at the time all of these islands believed, and I believe justifiably so, that the colonial office, or if you prefer the British government, had their favourite politicians. And that is one of the reasons the opposition in those days became even more determined, became more radical. And what have you? That was part of it. And by the way, I saw with my eyes, I almost say my own two eyes as we say, when George got defeated in 1974, that was no accident, you know. George was played badly. I was at the back of the moan at the polling station just past the little Catholic church up there. Right around there, there was a polling station, and there was a relay ballad going on. And the people that were supporting George, or the thing for George, were absent, there were no way around. So people were coming, they were giving a ballad that was already marked, going in, dropping it. As John Compton himself would say, one kind of coco macaquery took place there, that it would be impossible for George to have won in my humble opinion, could not have won. They played him, and they did Francis the same thing in Denry North. Francis Mitchell. I can tell you what he told me on that. He said, he had, I think it was 1974. Yeah, he said he lost, not because of Maroc. And Maroc was the seasoned politician. Let's say that, Peter. She was your house to house, everybody. She was in every Holy Mary and everything. So it means Harold and Rock. Maroc, Harold and Rock. And George told me personally, I wrote it, that he wasted his time campaigning for Dead Beach. And the Dead Beach he referred to in particular was on the Francois, because on the Francois refused to do house to house. So George was doing house to house, as George said, on behalf of him. But George didn't know house to house on his own behalf, Peter. He didn't believe in that. But George is not really a house to house man. George is a public platform man. And George, George admired and adored Francois, almost like a god, you know. He loved Hunter Francois because Hunter Francois, don't forget, was a literary man like George. He loved the English language more than he loved their own children. So the mind was important. So he was in love with his mind. Before we go to break, we want to take another clip in from Sir John. And he's talking about independence itself, when that day arrived. We didn't want to celebrate our independence on the set of riots, instead of that, that the, for instance, the flag raising ceremony was to be the only place we had at the time was the Marshall grounds. They mean the Philip Park, only place with the big open space as such. We had to keep it on the on the wall. Why did we keep it in the wall? Because of security reasons. The British will not allow Princess Alexandra, who was the royal representative, to drive through the Marshall road, lest she be ambushed, et cetera, et cetera. It's that type of fair, not us, because we know that was nonsense. We would never do this. That's not solution. But that British government representative had instilled, had pushed in the minds of the British, they were going to be riots, et cetera, et cetera. So we had it, low keyed. Many people didn't, didn't have it as we'd like to have had it. Instead of had the, the big celebration for independence, already the carnival that followed it, because it was a few days after carnival was a few days after independence without a hell of a time. But for those times, it's really frightening because of the threats that existed at the time, that there were going to be disruption, there's going to be this, going to be that. They, they customs and strike, we couldn't get people in. We had to get, had to send, send some people down there to take over from, from their customs that their people get their baggage through. A lot of difficulties, it humiliated us. Solution, it's humiliated us. But I told them at the time with all of this, they, they came to give us very bad press. I used the occasion of the youth rally in 79 to set out our goals. I told them, told the children at the time that we have to prove that not that we'll do no worse than those who ruled us before, not that we will do as good as they did, but we have to do better. And that is what I set out to do, to do better, to give solutions and opportunity that they did not have under the past regimes. So you heard Sir John there, they did, independence day arrives and he speak about having to hold that official ceremony there on the wharf because of the threats of violence. Rick, your reaction to that? Well, you see, again, I was, I was, while I was just going on, I was thinking, what is he talking about? And then of course, it occurred to me that a lot of what was going on in St Lucio was being covered by the British pressure just before the independence, including that statement by George that he can't guarantee the safety. St Lucio would not be the safest place in the world. All of that stuff also paid elsewhere. So that is why the British government would have wanted security. Actually, for instance, like Alexandros, I wrote about that arrival here. There were no crowds. There were no, there was no trouble. It was quite, it was almost a non-event getting here. So again, all of that was the mirage, but I can understand he played on it because George was especially George on independence. Peter's not so much in the independent story talking. It is George who had the whole BBC. George was like a movie star for all these foreign press. George, well, as we journalists, we don't go to listen to the quiet guys. We go to the guys who make the sensational statements and George and his background, theatrical background, it was street theater. And George couldn't wait until Martin Bell and his crew to record stuff and to publish it next day in British paper. So he's right. There was this affair or whatever. But there were some real, maybe Peter can talk that part, but there were some real occurrences on that. On the ground before then. We will get to Peter right after this break. Excessive agrochemical use, additives and genetically modified foods are harmful to health and the environment. Join the Good Food Revolution. Grow, buy and consume organic. A message from Rye St. Lucia and the Ministry of Sustainable Development with funding from the GEF Small Grants Program, UNDP. Peter, before we went to break, you're going to comment a bit there on what Sir John had to say regarding independence day and that official ceremony and the threat, the perceived threat of violence. There are two points that may not appear to be connected. And I hope your viewers, the audience and yourself could connect them. The first is, when you go to Oxford University to study politics, philosophy and economics, in the British culture and the British politics, you have come to be trained so that the British can send you back out to be a leader that Britain can deal with. As George Orton was so trained. Any one of those who went up there, Eric Williams, A.R. Robinson, Guy in Barbados was his name, Grant Lee Adam, not Grant Lee, Grant his son. All of these guys and more. So you expect the British press to pay a lot of attention to George. And George understood that. George loves the theatre. He loves literature. He likes to, George taught me in Form 2 at St. Mary's College. A lot of people don't believe that. There's a very big gap in age between us. And when George was lecturing, if he had slept the night before, a lot of times he came sleeping in the English literature class. But if he was feeling good, he would be prancing and walking and motioning in front of the class. No other master did that like him. He was a young fellow then. I was in Form 2 and I've never forgotten that. Remember that. The other point that is not connected, but you can feel free to connect it if you want. And Rick is correct. By the time the princess and the representatives of Her Majesty's government arrived in St. Lucia, the people of St. Lucia had literally sort of given up. The Labour Party had said, okay, well, you win this round. We'll wait till the elections to put it very succinctly. And I hope bluntly to, you have succeeded in getting it. We'll forget about that. And I don't think any body would have hurt or harmed the Queen's representative in St. Lucia. And I used to represent Marsha at that time. We never had a public meeting in Marsha. As far as I can recall, saying any negative thing about the Queen and the English Parliament and that and that. All our discussions were either on the Cassis market steps or elsewhere around the island. So if John Compton wants to say that the Queen would be unsafe because of all the nonsense that was going up to England, he probably had information that we at the time did not have. Okay? But do you think on the Grand Peter that perhaps the grand swell was so much coming from the work that St. Lucia, former St. Lucia Labour Party were doing that perhaps it could have been perceived that they would have been threatened? Yeah, but don't forget the people are not as stupid as some people would make them out to be. Because there were pockets of violence. Yeah, people can make up their own minds. And interestingly, one of the things that happened and I certainly had no knowledge of it, I'm not sure if George had, was when the prisoners in Cassis, they were all overcrowded in the Cassis at the top of Bridge Street there. And they often absconded. And they said the prisoner on fire. That was one of the big things that happened around the time of independence. But as far as the safety of her royal highness is concerned, I cannot say that that was an issue that I saw. But safety is always better. We want to speak about the 79 elections specifically. So we will hear, hold on Rick, we'll hear from Sir John on the 79 elections from his perspective. And we'll talk a bit about what was really going on on the ground at the time. And then I know that point you want to come to, we'll come to that as well. So let's hear from Sir John. And I never accepted we lose. The elections were hijacked. There was a hijacking. You know, all the threats. If you look and see the number of people who voted, it was one of the lowest. I think it's just over 55 or 60 percent voted. Thousands of people abstained because they were afraid. They were afraid. We lost the elections. We still, as the UWP, we still got 42 percent of the votes. We still had a substantial support. Now, you had this infighting within the Labour Party, which causes a lot of grief. You had the confusion between the Louisie faction and the Audemars faction. It is similar to what I had with George Charles in the 60s. You had a new set of people coming in and getting in conflict with the older regime. And you had this leadership struggle. But what gave this thing greater, greater impetus is what had happened was happening outside. You had the, in Cuba, you had Castro. You had in Jamaica, you had Manly. In Guyana, you had Burnham. And in Grenada, you had Bishop. So all of these factors concentrated on the confusion in solution. So John, they're speaking about the 79 elections, which were held on the 2nd of July, 1979, the Senucia Labour Party won 12th of the 17 seats, and the votes have turned out worth 68.0 percent then. So official statistics there on the 79 elections. So John says he didn't lose. The UWP didn't lose. The elections was hijacked. Your thoughts will go to you, Rick. And I know you also had a point that you wanted to make. Well, he's consistent because he has always said that. But in interviews like this, which he's not, nobody's proving for any answers, this is just an opportunity to vent, really, that kind of interview. Nobody's questioning him about, but what about this or what, none of that. He has always maintained from the election itself, and I guess he died, still thinking of that with a hijacked. But what is a hijack? What is a hijack? I mean, there's an election. He's the government. Governments have perhaps even more influence on things than the opposition, especially a radicalized opposition as it was at the time. So I have no idea what he meant by it was hijacked. He also insisted that people were afraid to come out to vote. That is possible because George had created, with their support and what not, the kind of support they had, the people who were coming out at the time. I can well understand that there may have been what we called earlier on the elitist set who did not, who didn't come out to vote. You only have to read Joyce O'Geese's autobiography sort of. And you get a feeling of that because Joyce O'Geese was part of that. So inadvertently, she tells you how she felt and how a lot like her must have felt as well. So I'm not going to argue with him that quite likely a lot of people, you know, who didn't vote. Well, that seems to me the fault of the UWP for not instilling in their people a feeling of safety that the elections would be properly secured, protected so that all the propaganda would be nothing more than propaganda. So if, I don't know, but if he let, if he dropped the ball and the labor party won, as a result, you don't call it a hijab, you screwed up. But it was a very well oiled machinery for the Senusia Labor Party joining hands with the Senusia Forum, Peter. And from all that I seem to have been reading and gathering because it was not of this time, George had such an integral part to play as almost a sort of campaign manager. I got the impression that he was the one who was really selecting the candidates and being able to do all of the strategic planning for the Senusia Labor Party having brought in the Senusia Forum on board as well. So do you believe, Peter, that the UWP and Sir John had not lost that election which was hijacked? I'm really sorry that this is what is being used now. The UWP lost the election fair and square and they knew that. Sir John Compton was a master politician and I'll tell you something. There is no other politician that I knew in St. Lucia or elsewhere who could destroy an opponent more thoroughly and completely than Sir John. When he was ready to destroy George Charles and they were in the same Labor Party, he said the British government came to St. Lucia to speak to George Charles who was chief minister at the time and George Charles used to like a good drink, okay, like so many other of us. Compton said they tried to wake him up in the morning and they called George Charles and George Charles slept. They tried to wake him and he slept. He was sleeping. The implication was that he was so drunk he couldn't wake up. And I'll tell you, he repeated that a few times. That is Compton repeated that a few times and that was the end of George Charles. In fact, I believe George Charles drank more after that. But what happened is that Compton had finally met his match. George Orlum could speak better than Compton, both in English, although George didn't start as a Creole-speaking person. He learned on his way and he always said that if he didn't have people like me around, he probably would not have learned. But Compton finally met his match in George Orlum. Although to some extent George did not destroy people as much as promote a new ideology and did it very famously, as he himself used to say, by dropping the pebble in the pool. So he knew when to thunder like a hundred volcanoes, or not volcanoes, but rather waterfalls and when to drop the pebble in the pool. And I developed that at one time too. And so when George or myself was speaking on the market steps and there were thousands of people there. There was a time, Lisa, I actually got frightened. I stopped to drop the pebble in the pool, as they say. And I could literally hear a pin drop. I said, Jesus Christ, these people are listening with so wrapped attention. How could you ever satisfy these people in government? What am I going to do? I've never been frightened before in my life or since. But it just goes to show how people were listening. So Compton no longer had the heirs of the people of San Dusha Adi had in George Charles time or even soon after George Charles for Kenneth Foster. Because Kenneth became the leader of the Labour Party, Kenneth Foster after George Charles. So Compton just used to run riot with these guys. But when he had George and myself, that was a double barrel attack. But why could it not work? That's the question I think I want to come to Rick and I see you. I want to comment a little bit on what Peter just said there. Understand that Peter is talking from the perspective of being on the platform. Right. I, on the other hand, I'm the journalist. I'm the one questioning of a particular kind of journalist. I'm the one talking to George off. I'm the one talking to Peter. I'm the one talking to people. I'm the one following them around. What these guys did, I said it earlier, was to empower. I use the word empower, I'm a caution. People who felt they were nothing. They gave those people a feeling of worth. George on all his literary allusions on platform. George was barely understood by 90% of the people who came to see me. George was performing. And I gave a number of instances where George misquoted Shakespeare, including I was a victim of that. I actually quoted him on something by Thomas Gray to find out later on. It was an absurdity. I corrected it later in my. But he also had a sort of answer that he did not have the grass root following that he wanted. Is that not? Oh, no, no, no. George had the grass roots. Oh, George had the guy. They developed it along the way. Peter, Josie, and George gave new meanings of grass root. It wasn't there. Some came in the States. But they gave St. Lucia meaning to St. Lucia grass root. Which was to say the ordinary, quote unquote, the ordinary person. The person who felt left out. The non-Bristols and the non-Girod type of people. Those people felt they had no status. And they were far more, as now, far more of those people. St. Lucia always had far more people who feel they have no status. Peter, Josie, and George gave them worth to come out. They were almost proud to be silly or proud to talk about their path and everything else. So there was a kind of rebellion against this, not a kind. There was a rebellion against the status quo. Peter could have said whatever he said on that platform. Some of it was grotesque, but don't know. The feeling for Peter now, even as we speak, I am sensing a kind of revenge by certain people. What is interesting also is that a number of people who are Peter's detractors are hard-core labor from that time. Some of them may well have had roots, you know, UWP roots as well. Like when he said earlier on, I think he did, that at a particular convention, when he lost, he lost in Calderon to challenge Julian Hunt, and they lost. And they were outside. That's quite true. Outside, we were talking and everything. And he interrupted that, Peter. He did. He said, guys, I better go on and congratulate Julian Hunt. That was the end of it. When he went to do that, he wasn't well received. But you have to think of the time, the atmosphere. It was right, and the right people were there to do it. George was there effectively to be Shakespeare. So to those with delusions of grandeur that they were like George. Like the students, the university students, all these guys. Where George has come? And then you had the radical ordinary Rastaman and all those guys. I mean, don't forget, these guys promised to free up the weed. All that kind of stuff was going on. And there was the rebellion against the status quo that Compton represented. So it was perfect for them. What happened afterward? And that's what I want to come to. What happened, Peter, because by all... Just to add a little bit of salt to what Rick just said about George. When George was going on with his eye for loot in English, a guy from Cast... And you know, Castries always had little city sophisticates who understood English, could speak English a little better than their country brothers. They would pass and George would be going on, man, and they would shout, What's why? What's castle? What's... Somebody don't understand. Let me know, but the impression of that, Peter, he's correct. They would stand out there, obviously not understood a word George said, and quite often George screwed up anyway, because George had no need to prepare. That's arrogance, okay? If not contempt. Monsieur, words, Monsieur, words, Monsieur, words. They have no idea what he's saying there. He's correct, but that isn't... But there's no English words, though. That is an indicator of George's ability at the time to walk on water. He could do no wrong, and yet could not get elected. And could not get elected. So that with all of the win and everything of Peter, the leadership struggle within the Libyan Party, why did that come about? How did that come about? You know, this is one of the saddest things that happened in my political lifetime, because when it was mooted that Alan Ruizy should be the leader of the party, because Kenneth Foster would not take us to victory, the first thing we did was to try to see if we can organize a convention. But George did not have the confidence that the people would elect him as political leader. I had no interest whatsoever. Interesting point. And I don't think anybody else had any interest. Why did you not have any interest? Because I think that there were people like George and others who were older than me, and maybe deserved a break before me. I thought I had time on my side. That was the main thing. It was that I was not ambitious, but I didn't think it was my turn as yet. Let's put it that way. And the name Alan Ruizy came up, and there were things said for him. But I said to myself, I didn't know the guy personally, but when I heard and read a little about him, I said, guys, George, I spoke to George in particular. I said, George, why? This guy is not going to be able to do what is demanded of us now. The Alan is going to be too conservative, too colonial, even more than Compton. But George at the time, his reply was, but you see Peter, he might be able to lead us to victory. I said, but even though he leads, he'll be prime minister. And that's the key point. But George was not seeing that. In other words, we could have gotten somebody, I believe, maybe younger and things though. But George wanted Ruizy because he thought Ruizy had the image, Gigi, George of the High Court, Supreme Court. I was never in favor of that. So after the leadership thing, it got to, I understood that George wanted to win with Alan Ruizy. But as soon as Ruizy wins, to knock him out of the prime minister's position and for him, George, to emerge as prime minister. Now, George has never discussed that particular point with me. I got to understand it afterwards. May I put the attack on Peter? Because in what he's saying, I got to understand. That's an interesting statement. I got to understand. Only after the elections. What it tells you, in other words, Peter, Josie had no idea that Ruizy and George had an arrangement. And even as he's speaking here and how George wanted that Ruizy, maybe he can make a swing and so on and so on, despite everything that was going on. They had to separate on all that. I am wondering now if that arrangement, Peter, and George's insistence on letting Ruizy make a good prime minister. If, in George's mind, he was thinking, I have an arrangement with him. Let him win the elections and I'll be prime minister six months later. Because that was the arrangement. That came out after the very first meeting where all of the candidates, the winning candidates won. The only person who did not contest elections and did not win and who was there is the President, Governor General. And what I understood, I was fully supportive of George up to that point because, don't forget, we had disagreed on the Ruizy thing, but I thought it was too small and if Alan Ruizy wins as prime minister, fine. But Ruizy at that first meeting said, when George actually brought up the point. Now, and that is the only time I knew, and that was after the election, that there might have been some arrangement. And Ruizy said, give me a year. May I come in again, please? Before the elections, because I had put together the manifesto, I was with the guys. So I put together, I mean, setting it up. I didn't write it there. I put it together for them. And I went, I was very much involved in the movement. And I went to Alan Ruizy asking him if I wanted, if he was okay to put his photograph on the front of the manifesto and so on. I couldn't just do that because they was acting with Ruizy and George anyway. And Ruizy took me upstairs to his shop, you know. And he wanted to discuss instead this. He says, Rick, we're going to win that election hands down, but we're not going to keep the government. And just after that, he never told me about the arrangement. He says, we're going to win the election hands down, but we're not going to keep the government. I found out later when George went, and that's where Peter comes in there because I think it was Peter who wrote to Ruizy, you know, you can take over Peter, telling him you made a bargain, keep it. No, I didn't, I didn't write. I spoke at the meeting. I said, you know, if you made a bargain, you should keep it. But, but, but there's nothing wrong in my humble opinion. Again, I keep using the word humble opinion. That we could not wait for Alan Ruizy for a year. After a year, things settle down. People are beginning to get accustomed to the Labour Party, the Governor General and the British government and the royal family does not like the idea or do not like the idea of the representative of the British Crown, which is the Governor General. Being shifted around as soon as an election is finished like a football. So Alan Ruizy. Yeah. And that was made known to us in no uncertain terms. In other words, wait a decent time, guys. You all just want, take it easy. Don't just kick off Alan Ruizy of the thing. But didn't Alan Ruizy resign before that, Peter, and took it back or something? No, no, not that I know of. Yes, he did. So Alan, so Alan Ruizy now said, and say, fine. I agree. I think you're right, but by then, I believe George might have written quietly to him and put so much pressure on the Governor General that he was prepared to go, but he wanted to go as part of an embarrassment to us. And I believe it's the British monarch, the Crown, that asked him not to do it, to put it back. I think that's what happened. But I, although I did not support Ruizy in the beginning, I said, guys, if the man wants one year to become Governor General, give him a year because we are five years. And George continued the nonsense to the point where he showed me a letter that he had written to The Voice newspaper to be published, telling the world that Ruizy would go and he would become Prime Minister. I said, George, you wrote that letter and you sent it to me. I mean, what came to my mind to tell George that day? You know, I had too much respect for him, and I'm remembering George from my days as a little boy at St. Mary's College. I said, but only a buffoon, a total jackass would do a thing like that. I said, well, how could you do that? And you're sending it to The Voice, knowing the God and family, what is that for? But there came a time. And that is where the government, when Ruizy got that, Compton started supporting Ruizy. Everybody started, oh yeah. Ruizy, there came a time though, when Peter was so disgusted with the whole power struggle and the repercussions and everything, he went on vacation in New York. And George wrote to him, Peter, go ahead, tell the story, I don't want me to say it. No, Barry August was there at the time representing us. And Barry, I went to see Barry just to say hello, pay my respect. And he said, George said to come back home right away. And he threw it a struggle. And I said to Barry, you know, I have supported George all along, man. I can't continue to do that. This is not politics. That is nonsense you are doing in the name of politics. And soon afterwards, the U.S. government invited me through the same Charlie Shelton whom George was having regular dinners with at Chef Harry to be a guest of the U.S. government in a program called United States International Visitors Program. I said, thank you, Jesus. It was for a month of six weeks. I'm sorry I didn't take the six weeks. The U.S. government took you wherever you want to go. Showed you wherever you want to see, learn the country, because that program was created to train young people in the third world that the American government feel would evolve one day into the leaders of their country. So they wanted you to have a good image of America. But all of these things, I'm telling you, man, listen to what didn't come out of that was while Peter was in New York, George wrote to Peter telling him... You wrote to Barrio Guiz? No, he wrote to you. He called you or wrote to you, whatever it was. And promising him he was through, he was going to accept Luizio's prime minister, come back. Josie came back and within two weeks it had flared up again. And that's where everything went. So I couldn't continue supporting George. And I told him so. I could not in good conscience. And you had to break that twin bond. Yeah, the people of Saint Lucia who supported us so much, man. So but you attend the people about horizontal government. There would be no leader from forum to now. And all of a sudden you feel... So one day we had an indoor meeting again of the elected members of the ministers. When the matter came up, Luizio played a card, a good domino player, Luizio was. He said, but Brother George, if I were to go up to government house as governor-general, how do you know that you were the one, the other 11 members or even myself, the 12 of us? How do you know that you would be the one elected to replace me? Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness, this George could not answer. And that time Luizio is looking at me. As if to direct everybody's attention towards me. That was a dirty little game. As if to say, well, how do you know it is not going to be Peter? As a matter of fact, when he left, I had almost all the votes, except that he pulled out Ribby Lesmond, took Larry Lesmond on a yacht with him, to get it Frances Michel, somewhere to Martinique, to go and drink some wine, and Winston Snack emerged as prime minister. That's prime minister. Again, you get the feeling of the comedy. You get the feeling of the comedy that I talked about earlier and how people have paid through the years in the Caribbean for these comedies by these politicians. Listen to what Peter is saying. This, it sounds so petty. It's underhand deals within the party or what not that nobody knows about. It sounds like a bunch of very uneducated, primitive people. But the lives of people depended on the decisions that came out of those comedic sessions. I want to play, I don't know if we have the time. George, before you go. We have to, we have to take a short break. Just before you go. Let me say, even in civilized societies, there's that kind of politics. Be mindful. Yeah, but they're a little more, it's a little more meaty, you know, like Trump and these people, you know. That's what you say. Loud shoulders. I don't think it's as petty as ours. But we want to take a break and when we come back, we'll continue the discussion. So let's take a very quick break and we're back with the discussion. It's getting warm. The biobutton is a state-of-the-art device. It supports people keeping regular checks of signs of possible COVID-19 infection while placed in home quarantine. It monitors temperature, heart rate, and respiratory rate. It is very simple. Just link it to your smartphone and place the button on your chest. It's that easy. The biobutton costs only 100 US for the 14-day period. For further information, please contact the Epidemiology Unit at 468-5325 or 468-5324. Thank you for staying with us and we continue the discussion. Were you there? A look back at the fight for independence in observance of the initials, 42nd anniversary of Independence in studio with me, Rick Wayne and Peter Josie. Before we went to break very quickly, we were running low on time. We want to get to a lot of other things but you had a point that you wanted to make, Rick. Yeah, based on what Peter was talking about, the relationship between George and Peter, that's a very important relationship. And there is something in my book that, I came out here at the end of writing the book to do a Q&A with George Adlum right after the 82 elections, which was a debacle for, okay, you don't want everything. And among the questions I asked him, some very interesting questions, by that time, of course, Peter Josie and George had fallen away apart. How do you feel having found yourself at war with Josie, hearing him say, you brought arms illegally into the country? And his answer, it just made me sick. I felt, first of all, that all of it was Josie playing politics. For example, he used the passport issue, St. Louisians have to check their history, to say I had an arrangement with a gun runner to bring arms into St. Louisia. Josie was being a political animal. He had no finesse or prestige. His harangues on the radio, those nightly harangues in Patua, were conceived to destroy me in the rural areas, my base. He kept saying that I was really a bourgeois because we used to be at a house that kept a state eating lobster. He probably didn't understand the religious temper of our people. They figured that if you were together enjoying lobster and champagne, why talk about it now? I had pinned the Judas thing on him. He sounded like a traitor spilling. I knew he was killing himself. Josie was playing a kind of politics I won't play. I would not just make up a story and pin it on a man. I never fought Josie with the gloves off. I never had the heart for it. I would go after him with an article, put a little heat on him, that's all. I actually fought back with only three articles. So I say, well, what about that article and the voice that described you as a sort of Jim Jones? So I never had proof that Josie was behind it. If he was, then he must have had outside input. There were people helping him out. But go ahead, there's another... So let me ask Josie then. That breakup of that twin bond, looking back, Peter, do you feel that you had been duped all along? No, the way I put it, and I am not even sure that I remember where that quote came from, I have felt a long time, Lisa, that I am a man more sinned against than sinning. There are people who, from day one, always feared me because I was like the lion of Judah in Central Asian politics. I was fearless. I was like the diamond in the star, the hardest of the hearts. And it was easier to go to an Oxford graduate whom they feel or felt at the time had command of the English language. Had more finesse. More finesse as they like to put it. But you know, you can have finesse on the public platform, but none at all on a one-on-one after dark, depending on who the female is. But we will not go into that. But what I can say is this, people, and including Rick, and I've asked Rick that question, I will not ask it again, but I'll just tell you the question I asked him a long time ago. How come, Rick, that you went to interview George to get a Q&A with George? I was deeply involved. Why not me? I think I knew sufficient English at the time to be able to give you an interview, right? But even Rick at that time, I must say, and it's past tense, but I have to tell you, at the time I felt, was sticking up with George Oksonian nonsense. Even though he was smart enough, and that is Rick again, was smart enough to check the quotations and to correct him and to realize why George is showing things. And one of them I remember quite well was when the children at the St. Joseph's Convent were asked to march against the education bill. And I remember you corrected him. Now that's a long time ago. That must have been 71 or 72 or something. So I don't have much to say on that, Lisa. I have come with clean gloves. People have looked at me, and one of the things I'm so happy about is it's difficult for people to believe at that age. And I've been living in castries, and now I'm grossly born there, different parts of the island in the north, for years and years and years. Up to today, I thank God that I was born in Viewfort. That only because there was only one secondary school on the island, and my father insisted that I have to try to get to St. Mary's College, and I thank God for him too. At the time, I didn't think... I was not very enthusiastic. But coming from Viewfort, I've always been able to look at castries like a foreigner might look at it. And I'm always very happy to look at Viewfort as a person from castries may be able to look at Viewfort. So that helped me a lot in my politics. Let's take a look at what eventually merged Rick, pardon, plywood city, this debacle post, the elections, and Sir John, what started it all, Sir John and his thank you rally in the William Peter Bouldvard. That era for St. Lucia, and Rick mentioned it earlier, is like our 9-11 sort of situation. Let's delve a little deeper into that. Would any one of you know that if Sir John knew that having his thank you rally in castries as opposed to his Miku base would have presented some form of threats? I don't think it entered John Compton's mind that Compton was convinced he had every reason to be convinced that he was something of a deity. And what had happened was that Josie and George had punctured that, but Compton would not, he said it was hijacked. So he probably still believed that he was still the Compton before that election. And he partly applied for permission for meeting. The Public Order Act requires that the police commissioner at his own discretion determine whether to give or not, not to go and ask anybody, because it's only the police will know do they have enough people, enough men, what is the state on the ground, etc., etc. And that police commissioner to show you how messed up things were, decided to call George Arlam, and not Arlam Nuisie, to ask if he should he give him a permit. And George said yes. And then he went on the program an early morning program to tell the whole of Saint Lucia that Compton had applied, the party had applied for a thing, and he was not going to behave like they did and withhold permission and whatever. He knows that the ground is not right for Compton, the people still are disgusted with him. And to be fair, a lot of things went on in that campaign that would really antagonize people. The police will pretty much take us every day, the arrest, all kinds of things were going on. And but he stirred that pot. It's like the Maccanteen thing, you know. So are they all honorable men and all that kind of stuff. He stirred that pot nicely. And what happened, again, I can't stop saying it. Peter, we talked about earlier, nothing to do with this. So Peter, you will know when year. No, but more than that, I knew what was going on would cause us to lose the government and to lose the next election. But let me say something, what Rick just said there, I think that's the first thing tonight that I'm going to disagree with him and disagree very strongly. The same way that Alan Luisi had said to Rick, even before the elections, Rick, we are going to win the elections, but we're not going to keep the government. Lisa, you may not understand it even now that you're a grown woman. St. Lucia was such a hot potato for the colonial people, for the Americans, for the French, for everybody. And Audlum and Josie were menaces. These guys from the colonial office to the American CIA, the American, whatever you want to call them, these guys had made up their minds that whatever government the two of us were in would not last. And I don't believe that Compton's application for a meeting was by accident. I think Compton was coached, was advised to do that. And I think they knew at the time that George would be arrogant and stupid enough to say, yes, go ahead. And George knew that there would be trouble. He knew that. It's not about being democratic that Compton would not do it. That is baloney. You are the government now. You have the safety of the country in your hands for the first time. And the safety of the people in the country is the first law in politics. If you know that there was going to be trouble, Compton could not have held a proper meeting on the boulevard before the elections. You think it's now the people are breathing a sigh of confidence. They feel, boy, now we can do something with our country or we don't want to come. Now you're going to call it a meeting on the boulevard. But let me agree. But that orchestration that human feces, the throwing of all of that. Let me agree. When that happened, Rick knows, I was going to drop my wife and all the way to Canada. You fought. And I was in view fought. The earlier part of what Peter said about the CIA, I'm not going to touch that. That's speculation. I don't have any evidence of that. But if Peter knew that, then I would imagine that George knew that, too. George knew. He knew. Okay. So if he knows the CIA has set up for chaos in the boulevard and etc. So then you played it to the end. Why would you go along with it? You all wanted to be a Morris Bishop. He wanted a revolution. We don't have time for that one, but he's right. We don't have time for that one. So anyway, I just want to read one little thing, Lisa. I know time is tight. I asked George after the 82 elections if he had any regrets of the things that it led. And now he's in the dollar rooms. So I said, any regrets? And he said, yes, one. I should probably have spent more time dealing with Josie and keeping him in line. I started out knowing that Josie had a basic weakness as a revolutionary, a kind of lack of humanity, a lack of ordinary concern for people. He would do political things in camaraderie, but I feel Josie would be driving along and he'd stop the car and say, Movin, Movin. I don't know who Movin is, huh? Movin, Movin, wait here for me. Don't move it. Don't move it, boy. It's important. Wait here for me. And Josie would drive off. Movin would stay in that place for three hours because he figured that a political directive had been given him. Wait there. Meanwhile, Josie got in a rum shop. He drank it in there. That was, that is the relationship that most of St. Lucia believes was ironclad. And because Josie still, I want to say that in his presence, Josie still reveres George Artemy in my mind. There are a lot of things Josie could say to elaborate on what has been written. He doesn't even touch it. He said a lot this afternoon. He said a lot, but I know there's a lot more he could have and he alone can explain why he is so protective of George Artemy's contributions to the history. But because Rick, let me say something to you. I've said that to you years ago. You asked me why was I not writing the truth as I knew it about George. I think George had just passed actually. And I said to you, I will not do it because he's not there to answer. But he was there at the time. We are two different people, Rick. I believe I'm a person of integrity, whatever people may wish to say about me. I would never say anything about what you just read, except that George is a liar. Movin was one of the guys whom I trusted the most to have a drink with me. And there is no where I could go that Movin would not be involved in. Movin was a guy, Movin Johnson was from Marsha. Okay. You know, just living just above me there. Very popular guy, very strong guy. He's since passed, he's since died. And I would never, never do that to anybody, especially to Movin. Were you involved in the Bishop meeting on South Peter? Which one? When... Memories Bishop came. The agreement at the Mikey Pilgrim should hold on. Were you involved in the integration? No, no, no. By that time George and I had gone our separate. That is correct. That is why he had Mikey as if Mikey was a replacement for Peter Joseph. Yes, yes. You know, none I was... He wasn't too kind with Mikey Pilgrim either in the book when it went out. Because Mikey would not do the things that I would have done. Okay. But we had a hurricane in, I'm Hurricane Allen in 1980. So the Louisie was replaced by Prime Minister Winston Snack that happened in 1981. The SLP had a series of strikes and Snack agreed to stand down with Michael Pilgrim of the Progressive Labor Party briefly serving as acting Prime Minister until the 1982 St. Louisian General Elections. And that election in 82, which was held on the 3rd of May, was won by the UWP under John Compton. And the UWP won 14 out of the 17 seats. And the voter turnout then was 65.8 percent. Just some facts there. He won a nomination? There were 14 out of the 17. 14. So it was 14-3 in the parliament. Yeah. So that 92 elections I was asking. So what happened? 82, yeah. 82 elections. So what happened, Plywood said, do you believe that sort of really set the trajectory for Sir John's return? It also gave the lie, the percentage turnout also gave the lie to the 79 elections, where they had 68 percent turnout. And Sir John said, people were so afraid they didn't turn out. This time, the people were supposed to turn out to vote for UWP and only 65 percent turnout. So when we are reading and thinking and doing it properly and doing it scientifically, these things are important. By the way, this was predictable, Lisa. There had been nothing but trouble with the Labour Party struggle, all kinds of problems, chaos. We don't have time to go into the details. But it was an absolute mess to the extent that that Louisie had resigned when his budget failed and Winston Snack, who replaced him, things didn't get much better. And there was a meeting involving Compton, the Ask Bishop. And George had formed his own party then. And George, yeah, to form his own party. And George was merely the really the big instigator of all of that. It culminated in an agreement that Mikey Pilgrim would hold on as Prime Minister and take the country into elections, I think six months later. But in all that time, it's like chaos. But did that time period do dealt a very big dissilvest to the country? Of course not. I believe, and that's a personal belief, I believe St. Lucia took a turn for the worse and has not turned around since what I call the Boulevard Explosion, which is all part and parcel of that same thing you're talking about, prior to the 82 elections. There was trouble almost from the time the Labor Party got into office in 79, right through 82. That's why I tell you, it's called 7982. A total as I started off, a rebellion against itself. With too many ambitions. I don't go into those, you need a psychologist for that. I just go, I'm more pragmatic. I know what happened in terms of people, like I don't know their motivations. I think Rick, without continue, I think though, St. Lucia's made the turn and recovered themselves. That is, that is what I think in 1997, when they returned the Labor Party 61. That was revenge for all the things that they have suffered. They gave Dr. Anthony everything that they asked for. They had banana people who were prepared to cut each other's. I think Kenny and Anthony had the perfect, he was the guy who was going to take care of all those ills. All of the ills that had visited us. All the mistakes that were made. The people of St. Lucia, especially those who supported the Labor Party. I ran against Kenny and Anthony at before in 1997. And I know strong UWPs who voted for Dr. Anthony. Oh, it was not a good thing. And throughout the island. But he could not have won 176. 16-1 without a lot of UWP votes. So the whole country came together. But I would still say that that Boulevard thing was about the wish that happened. What happened to follow up that was that further disappointment because it was expected, perhaps too much of Kenny, because he now had this mess to deal with. And to a large extent he brought some major discipline to the Labor Party as a party. But we're not discussing Kenny and Anthony today. But it was a big job to bring people back to, back to what? I thought the Labor Party. You know, you asked yourself back to what was he supposed to bring them back to it. You couldn't bring them back to the time of Compton because that was a problem. So he had to be middle of the road. He had to instill in people the confidence that they could do things themselves. But it's not an easy job, at least I have to say that as well. And I'm glad for the opportunity to say that. Being the prime minister, being a politician, a prime minister in Saint Lucia is no easy job. Saint Lucia is a poor country. Very little resources. People have all kinds of ambitions that have nothing to do with Saint Lucia in reality. And you're supposed to deliver. So you pander and you become like the monster you're fighting. So it's not an easy job at all. So I need to ask about the relationship between... Sorry, Peter. I need to ask about the relationship between Sir John and George Audlum. Because later on we would see that the two of them having the alliance political party. Rick, perhaps, and perhaps you too, Peter, would give us an idea was there ever a relationship between George Audlum and John Compton? And what exactly was that relationship? I think every politician in Lucia the higher echelon once wanted to be John Compton. I think Kenny in his heart of heart wanted to be a John Compton. George Audlum in his heart of heart wanted to be a John Compton. Because Compton set the mold. Compton was a deity for most of his time. I will never know what Compton's motive... I used to be his personal assistant and very close to him on a personal level. But I can't answer that question. I know for a fact that he, when George was dead, he sent George to the UN. I am finding out now that there was never any of the usual process, Peter, of your papers to the governor general and so on. I don't think that ever occurred. So it seems that George simply went and took over the job as UN ambassador. And ostensibly, I have no proof of that, Compton had promised George that come a time he would run, he would be prime minister to follow. But of course we know what happened. Von Luss was the guy Compton chose and you will remember also George quit his job at the UN to come fight Von Luss. Convinced he was going to win and Von... Von beat him. So I don't know, but it was definitely a charitable move to rescue George as Compton said from a Choiselle rum shop over there. So I don't know. Well, let me say something quickly before you go to break. You ask about George and Compton. Staffy, George's father had to get at Mr. Morissette who was on Bridge Street and Staffy was on St. Louis Street. The two leading barbershops in St. Louis at the time. Almost everybody went to either Staffy or Morissette. George was well known as his father's son who was fairly bright in the Boyard St. Mary's College, etc. And George told me he used to have conversations with Compton when he was as young as 19 years old. So Compton and George knew each other and George always put acting and literature before politics. When this little ammunition, not I'm the guns, I forgot a barata when the little baratas had arrived in St. Lucia. George told me he actually took one to Compton's home and Mitchell, the Prime Minister of St. Vincent at the time who was cousin to Compton were there and maybe they had a gathering for Son Mitchell. George took the thing and called Compton in a private thing I did in his bedroom or what. And showed him this is a guy you're trying to fight. You don't like him. You don't like him. So George was always a joker fellow an impressionist given people the impression that he was a revolutionary and all the things he said about he's more sure about himself. I don't like to say these things. That was a puppy show. That's part of history. That's part of history. But that was a puppy show thing. What have you taken this thing for to show Compton for? Let's hear from Sir John as we go to break. We'll play the clip of Sir John speaking on the alliance the political party with George Odlam. And they talk about the alliance. I thought it was a great idea. I still think it was a great idea. But you have people with personalities. When you're dealing when you're having an alliance you have to deal with people. And it couldn't work. As I if we want to personalize the thing I would work with George but I would not work on the George. I made it very clear. I would work with him. My relationship with him was something that people don't understand. My personal relationship with him never diminished. I mean he I knew that he had certain ambitions and I was in his way and he did certain things that I felt offended by. But it never never really affected the relationship that I had with him from boyhood. But when it came for us to work we worked together but I wouldn't work on to him. So because look I mean it's not power I'm craving. I've been Prime Minister for all these years. Now I'm going to come to work in a subordinate role. I would not do it. So because of that the alliance broke up. That's it. It was not no more than that. If we had worked out something a real alliance between us the alliance between us did not come. They could not see how it could work. So and we were the major players in the alliance and once we parted it went. That's why we worked for Corona. And it was a movement and a speed test. Right? Every one of us had to work for public relations there. We had to do it. We had to talk in a public place like Bolamé. Base T-Boutique Change Social Distance Six feet Rodeo Nalot Ika Toa Vaitan Siu Sentikou Pakodial Quarantine Kou Partware Contact Epilot Encauté Toape Esposé C'est un écouillé Free 1-1-0-B Né Potclé Nikiopueu Le Péiadimia Clé Savledi Le Supermarket Formassi Epi-8m Yo Accessab Avancé Tetsue Péiaklé Aplé Savledi Tout Bagai Femé Avancé Tues Sevi Protocol Comme Sotipa Biwo Education Santé Nous tout ensemble s'assover Vémin Corona Si nous tout Sevi Jidla A Toute L'E Were you there a look back at the fight for independence? That's our discussion and at the panel table Rick Wayne and Peter Josie So we heard just going to break Sir John speaking about the relationship with George Odlam as well as the Alliance I know you had a lot to say Rick at the time that the Alliance was formed What are your thoughts now looking back? I should first want to address what the Prime Minister just said I was at my house My Prime Minister Compton Former Prime Minister Compton I was at my house one day and two prominent gentlemen came to see me and they gave me the whole story of what they planned with the Alliance and so on and they wanted me to come to a certain address to have a discussion with them and with Marella Joseph George Odlam and Sir John and they were talking and talking and talking and I put it straight I said well who is the leader of this group because they were planning a meeting public meeting two or three days later who is the member of this group and Compton says well it will just emerge George Odlam would not commit himself and Marella Joseph who I think was one of the most underestimated politicians in this country and I can't speak too highly of her I thought the U of B crucified her at the U of B of the day crucified her these were people like Joe Busquey Rufus Lawson Caldron was I think Lawson Caldron worked with her and so on but they would be back in that time the last thing they would even imagine is having a woman lead them it was so bad that when Marella was on a platform most of the guys would leave the platform step off the platform that's how bad it was they totally underestimated her I think the only guy who spoke well of her to me was Arsene James no no was it I think it was Arsene James oh would it have been Izzy Keller I'm not sure one of them it probably more Arsene I'm not I'm not sure but I thought they treated her very very very bad now the alliance thing Marella interrupted and she says a frequent gentleman and you know how much gonads it takes for a woman who's just coming into this picture it with these two political giants and she's almost a non-entity a school principal of few weeks earlier and she said gentlemen if Rick Wayne cannot understand this three-headed leadership thing how are we going to spell that out to the people at a public meeting neither of them answered and I will tell you something private as well that evening they were pairing on my show on talk and Marella came earlier than the other two I said to her Marella whatever you're doing don't give up your leadership of the party until etc etc the show was terrible it was a repetition of what had happened at the meeting nobody wanted to say who was going to lead the group etc and shortly after that Marella emerged leader of the united workers party now Compton says the real reason was he refused to work under George Adam that's the first time I've heard him articulate that but that was the suspicion anyway how could Compton go working under George Adam and George Adam went into the alliance to lead the alliance at the end of the day Marella outwitted both of them we want to go back to Sir John and hear him speak about the leadership struggle and going back to elections in 82 I'm speaking we got pulled into the Cold War they saw an opportunity of capturing St. Lucia but using this new leftist element now the person who stood in their way was Luigi Luigi refused to give in and he had to be pushed aside so you had this confusion in St. Lucia with this leadership struggle between the the new left and the old left new labor and old labor etc and St. Lucia population got caught up in it but they weren't really involved it was a little struggle by a small clique of people no it collapsed the whole thing collapsed and we had to go back into elections in 82 which we won and we won handsomely Peter your recollections at that time I would not put it the same way that Sir John put it but that is his prerogative and he's no longer there for to dispute what I'm saying the point about it is that I think I've gone through that I've explained already it was the time for a new thinking a new politics and that Sir John Compton had done everything he had to do for St. Lucia and in our opinion at the time only a new thinking and a new community of spirit among grassroots people would take us where we had to go so I mean he came back and won in 82 and he won handsomely and it is our fault so I don't blame Sir John I don't blame anybody and he's correct that there was a leadership struggle we have all seen that we have gone through it yeah but he gives a certain angle through that leadership score like I was outside interference and so on there wasn't yeah well as far as I'm aware I don't think there was any outside interference there was strictly ambition with George and Luigi exactly so even to call leftists and things so these are labors people put an U I wouldn't be surprised if people still regard me as a leftist for my views but that being said I have no regrets about my role in the politics of St. Lucia if I had to do everything over again even though an entire government collapsed and did not deliver to the people what was promised even don't put words in my mouth I'm asking the question let me say what I was saying even though if I had to live my life all over again the only thing I think I might do differently is to dissociate myself from George at an earlier time that's the first thing and the second thing I would do and I would advise any young person who thinks that they're ambitious and they're good enough do not follow anybody and do not be second to anybody if you are serious and you want to become involved in politics you make sure you get at the top of the party to control and do the things that you think are necessary but don't be second fiddle to anybody and that's one of the regrets I have in my life what about where George has his own version of how he got you to vote against the budget that in fact brought down the government because what he said was that he had to persuade you and his speech did it that's in Hansard as well he delivered that speech and afterwards that's where you changed your mind but George was always inflating his own ego that was the problem I told George I think I told you so too I went to have a private chat with Alan Luisi in the Prime Minister's office Alan Luisi and I always spoke well in fact I was the one who went to canvass Alan Luisi when Kenny George and I went to Kenny's home and wanted Kenny to be a senator and then Kenny Anthony I'm talking about I went to Alan Luisi as Prime Minister I said Prime Minister I would like you to tell me what would your cabinet look like if you won that vote of confidence in the budget he couldn't answer me he couldn't say but I said but you know we have been campaigning and conversing against you remaining as Prime Minister okay so tell me if I voted for you for example or if the others voted for you and you survived what would the new government your new cabinet look like or would you reshape it that is something every person who follows politics would like to know why was there a need for a new budget for a new cabinet but I'm saying because that was the budget we're talking about I'm assuming yeah but if your budget fails that means you have failed and if if you succeeded if you succeeded and you had ministers not supporting you you understand so you had to do something about it but Alan could not answer me and that time I said to myself you know this guy is really weak I really can't support him it had nothing to do with what George said George was more afraid of me than anything else because George knows my views and what I was capable of doing because it was just a time like that in the Caribbean not only in St. Lucia okay but are you concerned with what's in Hansard about this particular episode because he says the whole story of how he persuaded you by his oratory and whatever to um but that would not be recorded in Hansard like that they probably record what he says just what he said oh but he said that in the parliament because he was talking about I forget the topic but that is in Hansard about how he persuaded you to to to to vote against the budget yeah but you know there was a lot he persuaded me to continue serving with him as if I was a little boy though all right you know there was a lot then post the so 79 82 coming out of that there was a St. Lucia that needed healing and so John spoke about building back the country afterwards so let's hear him speak about that we had to start to rebuild we had to start to rebuild in 82 and as a person was there it took me three years before we got up at the bottom before we start to move people didn't know the trouble we had but we had help again because of the Cold War the Americans were very happy to see those guys go so they came and gave us assistance gave us financial assistance to start rebuilding the Canadians help us the British help us because they didn't want us to go the way of Grenada remember within 21 days of of St. Lucia's elections we were in the 22nd of February on the 13th of March there was a Grenada revolution so we got caught up in that we got caught up in in this that is how St. Lucia became that is why you know after the the elections then there was the the Grenada revolution and all this confusion in then as soon as we returned by 83 the intervention in Grenada again we got sucked in to external politics and we had to fight our way and confine ourselves rather than being drawn by it the first mistake there is that as I recall Peter Grenada was a year before preceded our election but it had it had impact but it preceded our elections and so do you believe that the Grenada set the stage for where we would have been yeah right so so John is right in that way that perhaps the Americans had their eyes but yeah he can he can't confuse himself there because he said both Grenada was in October of the year before and the Americans and as I said earlier I have no written proof but I know the Americans had a say in what was going on because these guys did not want to see Morris Bishop's friends or anybody related to what we call progressive and they were concerned about their own black societies when you have progressive people in the Caribbean leading and talking the kind of politics we're talking at the time if that got to the black Americans they would rise up faster but they had the black power movement yeah but but guess what they never converted it into political power that's another story so now that we are 42 years passed later in our independence are there new actors replaying old roles can you see that as you look at our political landscape are there glimpses of what that time period would have meant for us are we seeing that at all emerging at this time I don't see anything emerging and I'd be honest with you the work was hard what I see now is everybody trying to use television using social media using this but in those days of Odlam myself as Rick would tell you we were on the platforms morning, noon and night sweating it out and it was hard work five years straight getting yeah getting to the various nooks and crannies of St. Lucia the constituencies and things right now I believe there's an attitude in St. Lucia today that if you play with social media you're on Facebook and things so you can use that to campaign sit at your home as an amateur politician and hopefully win an election but I don't think there's any body in St. Lucia that I can think of either in the UWP the Labour Party or no party who is prepared to come and say listen I'm mounting a platform whether I stand alone at a street corner launch a party with two other guys and to say do what we're going to do say what we intend to do the name of the party I don't see any body in St. Lucia I wish I was wrong about this right now you know there's a nice creole phrase you know when people want things without working for it you know they they don't want to plan the food they don't want to go and harvest it they don't want to put it on fire and cook it but once it's ready they'll be the first at the table that is the attitude I see in St. Lucia right now among people who pretend that they want to be in politics so Rick any are you seeing history repeating itself in any way 42 years later the very very sad situation in St. Lucia is the musical chairs thing it's as if there are no possibilities out there the politicians the little party for example I mean does somebody expect that if the little party should win the election that there will be positive change and people would suddenly get ideas that they didn't have all those years maybe but that would be a miracle we have a prime minister right now who from the start tells you he's speaking outside the box in fact from the very beginning he stated I will not be like what's gone before and I supported that I support that on the basis that what went on before obviously has failed us miserably in every way our people could not be more polarized than we are right now for you to be powerful you must be together we can get together nothing not even on COVID we can't wait to count the deaths and all and everything wrong with the CMO there's a cut across there's a war going on between the government and the opposition even on a life and death matter like COVID and when I say the government and the opposition I'm talking about the traditional population so the population is at war with itself yet again in a life and death matter okay so the future I don't even know what the future is because the politicians are not have not allowed themselves even to think of the reality of the fallout of COVID now let alone if there is such a thing as post COVID what post COVID means so as I was saying earlier it's like the whole thing has been a very expensive comedy from 79 and a very expensive comedy the same victims the same and these are the poorest people in the country over and over politicians come in and use the poorest people in the country to get into office bananas I'm going to have such a story again the same people because people very few of those people who were down there so to speak are up there now we have a growing rebellious poor people going on for a lot of some reasons that have nothing to do with St. Lucia by the way but how do you look forward to a future when you don't know what the future you have no idea what the future is going to be so all you can do now is look at past performance and you now want an adventure a guy who's going to take chances a guy who shows he thinks not always right because when you think when you act outside the box there's a saying that only those who do nothing will not make mistakes so that's the balance St. Lucia now has to stretch so I don't think anybody can predict a future for the country they can say how they feel it ought to go and how people ought to think but I don't think anybody can tell you this is the future so what future did you envisage for St. Lucia Peter I am happy to be here today because it's 42 years and I thank God first that I've lived to be able to say how I felt and how I still feel about certain matters as everybody knows I was literally shone the door of the labor party by Mr. Hunt Julian Hunt when he became leader the people at Viewport South that day in 1992 from Labry Boy School invited me to come with them let's go and get Mr. Girodi and Mr. Compton right now we join in the UWP I said no eventually I took my stand and I joined when Vaughan Lewis invited me to work with him as minister in the minister of agriculture I have no regrets about this thing what I see right now is for us to pray to pray that young people both men and women will rise with their education and be committed sufficiently to see in St. Lucia prosper economically and socially and come and take their place among political people that are serious about politics we have to live our future and the prosperity of our people and our country in the hands of people who are determined to make a contribution to a positive St. Lucia thank you so much for that and our time has indeed wrapped up I want to thank you for participating and for you our viewers of staying tuned and listening to were you there a look back at the fight for independence not just on the people who lived through that era of 1979 to 1982 but they were actually integral players in that time period I am Mr. Joseph thank you so much for joining us once again and as we close we leave you with Sir John in his own words our problem of independence started from 78 when the negotiations with and the confusion local confusion I am speaking about the assistance with the British government representative the Latok Eric Latok I must mention his name you remember when they went and the other one came in they went to Malaba and smashed it up and the confusion the planning to take over by force because the if we had I always say that looking back is a good thing we'd lost those elections because they had their plan well made to take over by force