Kenny refuses STAR Interview

Rick Wayne hardly visits the STAR these days, now that he has mastered the ability to e-mail his articles, regardless of his location. On Wednesday morning, he strode into the editorial department and even before his usual ‘Hello, how’re you guys doing?’, the publisher asked how much I knew about Kenny Anthony’s most recent allegation about Choiseul MP Rufus Bousquet.
I repeated the the allegations as broadcast on the television media of what Dr Anthony had said at Lorne Theophilus’ launching, since I had not covered the event. I suggested getting copies of the launching.
“No way,” he said, “I don’t want anything secondhand and I don’t want to hand anyone an excuse to attack me as discriminating. If we are going to feature story after story about Kenny and Grynberg, let it also be seen that we carry what he has to say about other MPs. Call him and see if he’ll repeat what he said in Choiseul.”
I did. Dr Anthony answered and I asked if he would be so kind as to tell me what he had said at the launching. His response surprised me. We’d always enjoyed a good relationship.
“ I refuse to give any story to the STAR,” he said. “The STAR is hostile to the Saint Lucia Labour Party and I will not give them a story.”
I tried to persuade him otherwise. I said we had not featured Labour releases in recent times for the simple reason that his party had ceased sending them to this newspaper. But he would have none of that. He repeated over and over that the paper was hostile to the Labour Party and so he would not entertain any conversation with its reporters. He asked that I pass that message to “your boss and [editor] Nicole.” He said he would not give interviews to the STAR and did not want his statements published in the newspaper!”