Much Ado About Crossing The Floor The Way It Was Then . . . And Now!

[dropcap]T[/dropcap][dropcap][/dropcap]he de jure SLP leader Philip J. Pierre had been his normal over-cautious self, dropping at a press conference just enough to spare himself the Brutus stabs of his party’s long knives—and not nearly so much as was likely to mark him an enemy of the occupiers, current and previous, of Saint Lucia’s most coveted mansion on a hill.

As for the usual suspects, they had dutifully done their best, via Newsspin, to echo Philip. What I needed was to hear directly from the Laborie people, famed for their predictable unpredictability in matters of politics—as indeed I’d long ago proven for myself. Back in the day, by which I refer to that certain Sunday following the general elections of 30 April 1987, a Thursday, I had set out to experience up close the implied disappointment of the constituency. Truth be told, the reports I now speak of were from deeply distressed SLP apostles with whom I was then closely associated. We shared at the time the same aspirations, at any rate, political, that by whatever legal means the prime minister John Compton had to be removed and replaced by my then close friend Julian Hunte—the day’s leader of the Saint Lucia Labour Party. He and the prime minister had married the daughters of the island’s first governor general, Sir Frederick Clarke. Alas, it had been years since the relatives by marriage exchanged fraternal words . . . but that’s for another confession. Suffice it to say Julian and I shared similar sentiments when it came to “Neville Cenac’s betrayal of the people of Laborie.” So when I drove to the village on the remembered Sunday, I had a pretty good idea what I was looking for. It was hardly classified information that my personal relationship with Compton and Hunte was in great part based on the Machiavellian enemy of my enemy principle. Following, my report as it appeared in the STAR of 13 June 1987—entitled It Ain’t That I don’t Love You, Babeee!

* * * *

It’s a glorious Sunday morning, just a few days after Neville Cenac delivered his contribution to what had been advertised as the 1987 Budget Debate, and I am on my way to discover first-hand how Laborie is coping with the defection of a long-time SLP stalwart to the United Workers Party that he had famously renamed “United Wreckers of the Poor.” In Vieux Fort, as I head for the Cloud’s Nest restaurant, I am almost overcome by nausea I stubbornly attribute to a stomach too long empty, despite the nagging echoes in my head that insist on returning me to Tuesday’s parliamentary session when the House, with the approval of the newly installed Speaker Wilfred St. Clair Daniel, was transformed into a laundromat for the dirtiest linen. Over and over the lines come back to me: Broken promises . . . It ain’t that I don’t love you, babeee, it’s just that I can’t take it no more!

At the Cloud’s Nest I say hello to the proprietor’s brother, former SLP MP Bruce Williams, and invite him to comment on the day’s betrayal. “Oh,” says always avuncular Bruce, “There’s more to it than meets the eye, you know. Perhaps now his constituency will get some attention.” He chuckled before continuing: “Some people aren’t happy about the move, however!”

Hardly what might be described as a string-him-up-by-the-balls verdict, you’ll agree, dear reader. No bloodthirsty, crucify-the-bastard cry for vengeance. What Bruce Williams (“Daddy Bruce” to nearly all of Vieux Fort) had served me was a lily-livered suggestion that Cenac’s balletic prance across the floor was no big thing, never mind it may have upset a lofty ambition or two. Alas, I did not at the time of delivery grasp the message handed me; maybe because my ears were tuned to a different wavelength. To paraphrase George Will, writers are people too; we have our prejudices, acknowledged or not.

I turn my attention to the bacon and eggs before me while Williams, among the several casualties of the legendary 1982 general elections, returned to his earlier preoccupation. Soon I am on the road again to Laborie, feeling much better. But not for long. As I approach Black Bay the weird feeling in my stomach returns and now I know it never had anything to do with hunger. I shove my Suzuki into third and shoot up the road to La Croix, at the bottom of which lies Laborie, by reputation the Labour Party’s most reliable stronghold.

Childhood memories flood my mind. I mentally revisit the times I had fallen off my bike as I pedaled up and down La Croix. At least as many times had I sneaked out when my parents imagined I was asleep, to play Romeo to a particular La Croix resident’s Juliet. Several yards past the Etans’ family home, I turn right onto a concrete road built shortly before the April 6 elections. By popular account it was supposed to give users reason to vote UWP. It did not. Halfway down the concrete pathway I stop at a wall house, having recognized the Mitsubishi parked in front of it, a sure sign the owner is at home. If anyone in the village can serve as a reliable measure of the present mood it’s him.

There are no ears closer to the Laborie turf, or so he would have it.

“Rocky! Rocky!” I shout from my Suzuki. His 14-year-old daughter appears at the front door and invites me to wait for her father in their living room. He appears seconds later, struggling into a shirt the color of his bloodshot eyes. I wonder: has this strappy grown actually been crying?

“Well, Rocky,” I begin, “tell me about this Cenac fiasco. What the hell happened? Did anyone know in advance about the crossover?”

“It’s a very bad situation,” he groans. “Labour supporters are mad as hell, considering that long before the last election Cenac swore rumors concerning his crossing of the floor were totally false. Shortly after the April 6 poll he secretly started removing his things from his Laborie office. I would not be surprised if all that’s left is his refrigerator.”

“So then why was he elected a second time on April 30?”

A frown furrows his brow. “That’s because it was very difficult to believe Cenac could be such a traitor. I had my own strong suspicions. But few Laborians were inclined to view Cenac in that light. They had to see to believe.”

“And now?”

“It’s a very bad situation,” Rocky says for a second time. “Everyone considers him a damn traitor. Just one day before he crossed the floor he took some trusted constituents to the Chak Chak restaurant in Vieux Fort and told them Compton was about to make him communications minster, which would place him in a position to employ out-of-work Laborians.” Rocky volunteers that former SLP political leader and prime minister Allan Louisy knew nothing of Cenac’s plans until he was informed one day before the April 30 poll “by a guy named Buck Owen, Cenac’s main speaker during the campaigns.”

I bring up the SLP’s performance at the last House debate and Rocky expresses deep regret that the prime minister had been left free to level all kinds of accusations against the House opposition in their absence. They should have stayed in their seat, he says, but they wanted to be in time for that evening’s rally in Laborie. “The meeting went well,” Rocky assures me. “Very well.” He pauses, as if in deep thought, then adds: “As far as I’m concerned, anyway. There are some who say Laborie supported Cenac at the elections. That’s not true. We voted for our party.”

Rocky reminds me that Allen Louisy had polled over two thousand in 1979, while Cenac’s highest score was “just one thousand and some.” Proof, by Rocky’s yardstick, “that the man was not all that popular round here.”

“Is there likely to be any action against him?”

“Definitely,” Rocky assures me. “The people have already started referring to him as Judas. I believe he’ll be in for some very rough treatment whenever he visits Laborie.”

As I say good-bye to Rocky and head for my vehicle, a young passerby stops me to say she was less than happy about the STAR’s review of Cenac’s most recent House address: “There was nothing brilliant about what he said. “But I won’t not say more. I’m a public servant and already Compton has promised to fire 1500 of us.”

Later an elderly woman, close to tears, tells me how nice Neville Cenac has always been to her. She proffers that she always saw him “as my son.” Apropos his surprise move, she says: “I still love him dearly. He’s a good man. But I never expected him to do what he did. If you write what I’m saying in your paper, please don’t write my name. I wouldn’t want Mr. Cenac to think I don’t love him anymore. I still love him. But he should not have gone over to Compton.”

The devil’s advocate in my soul is unstoppable: “But what if his crossing brings good things to Laborie?” She looks down at her bare feet, slowly lifts her head to look into my eyes. “It’ll be wonderful if he can bring good things to Laborie . . . We have nothing. Bad roads, no water. But no matter what they do for us, I still will not vote for UWP. No one in my family has ever voted UWP. I’ll never vote UWP.”

A young man joins us, a blaring transistor radio attached to his face. It is tuned to Radio Saint Lucia, which is broadcasting for the umpteenth time Cenac’s It Ain’t That I Don’t Love You House address. When finally it comes to an end—by which time several other people, young and not so young, have joined us—I ask the young man his thoughts on Cenac’s reasons for crossing the floor, most of it centered on a soured relationship with SLP leader Julian Hunte.

“I don’t think it’s a big deal that he crossed the floor,” he says. “Why should he be criticized for doing what he considered the right thing in the circumstances?”

Down by the marketplace, near the spot where my family home once stood, I approach another mixed gathering, some busy playing dominoes, most of the others just looking on or leaning intimately on shoulders impressively muscular from years of daily fishing aboard row boats. It turns out the last thing they want to talk about is precisely what for the last three weeks has engaged Castries intellectuals.

Someone reminds me of what the area we were in had once looked like. “An outdoor arena,” he says. “Remember how we used to wrestle and box here? Remember how we learned to ride our bikes going round and round the market?” Just then several other people, mostly women, were marking the third anniversary of the Laborie Mothers and Fathers group. The sounds of Bob Marley, George Jones and Lovindeer help keep the mood festive, as does the dizzying mixed aroma of chicken frying and fish roasting on open fires. At the nearby rum shop business is brisk. No one brought up the subject of Cenac’s big move.

  Moving on, I stop in Saltibus and Choiseul before turning around and making more stops in Augier and La Grace. Some of the people I met readily expressed their opinions on the latest political news; others said they were totally unaware of Cenac’s change of allegiance. I formed the impression the man was generally well liked and that those who were not particularly thrilled by his volte face were also not concerned enough to express a point of view, one way or the other. I discovered much later that three busloads of residents from some of the very places I had visited had journeyed to Castries to celebrate with Neville Cenac.

Update: Last week Choice TV featured one of its reporters questioning some Laborie residents about the appointment of Saint Lucia’s new governor general. The consensus was: Why not? He’s a good man. Let’s give him a chance and see how he does. Sentiments to that effect. Considering what was being suggested in Castries—that Cenac’s immediate predecessor Dame Pearlette, recently declared “an iconic Laborian,” had been forced out of office—what the soi-disant “President of the Republic” had publicly uttered about Cenac; and other political persiflage, I was amazed to see and hear Janeka Simon’s on-camera questions about the new governor general. Obviously I’d forgotten about my own investigations back in May 1987.