When Soufriere’s not doing well, Canaries also suffers. So does Choiseul. So does all of Saint Lucia.” So declared Prime Minister Allen Chastanet at the opening of Soufriere Square on Thursday August 1. Mr. Chastanet should know. He is, after all, no stranger to the town, famous as “Saint Lucia’s garden”. Not only does he have familial roots there, in 2011 he contested the seat and lost to Harold Dalson. Hardly something he is likely to forget any time soon. At the square’s opening ceremony, Chastanet recalled that following Hurricane Tomas and after several visits, he realized the people of Soufriere had lost hope, had stopped believing in themselves.
“The fact is the Labour Party had been in government for three terms at that point,” he said. “The town’s MP was from Soufriere. Yet they seemed not to have a plan for the town. Or if they did, they obviously lacked the capacity to implement it. They showed no empathy with the suffering of the Soufriere people.”
He said there was nothing in the community in which the residents could take pride. Referencing the “world-class hotels in the community”, he asked: “When do you see those guests coming to town? When have they been encouraged to appreciate the town’s world heritage status? Where were the recreational facilities for the people in Soufriere?”
In consequence, Chastanet said, tourists arrived at the Soufriere dock and immediately boarded a bus without interacting with the people and town. He declared the newly opened square in the town’s centre as the “heart of Saint Lucia”. The prime minister said it was part of a greater plan that will enhance the community, citing other accomplishments: the Hummingbird Beach Project, the Mini-stadium, the Old Trafford Complex, road repairs and expansion of the Sulphur Springs among them.
“When we were elected in 2016,” he went on, “we promised to build a new Saint Lucia because the old model was no longer working . . . We will build a new Soufriere-Fond St. Jacques, and we will build a new Saint Lucia by doing the same for every community.”
