Tulsie responds after being told by the UWP’s Augustin to “Go to Guyana”

2045

The tumultuous relationship between the Saint Lucia National Trust (SLNT) and the incumbent United Workers Party appears to have worsened this week, after the political party’s General Secretary Oswald Augustin called on the organization’s director Bishnu Tulsie to “go to Guyana.” Augustin took Tulsie to task on Thursday during a call to Radio 100, where he commented on some of the SLNT’s concerns regarding the Cabot development.

Oswald Augustin (left) and Bishnu Tulsie

“Mr. Tulsie is a politician, I just want Mr. Tulsie to go to Guyana and sort out their election issues instead of trying to sort out Saint Lucian issues. Case closed! Now I’m getting very bad on that one. Go and sort out theirs before you come and sort out mine. Alright, sort out yours before you sort out mine. Case closed,” Augustin stated.

“I have to get bad on him because there’s too many things other people and the Labour Party has done in Saint Lucia and you heard no noise about it, and that is the problem I have. If you going to talk about one, you have to talk about all. That’s the bottom line. When one there you quiet and when another one come you making noise? No! Go and sort out the election issues they have in Guyana first and then come back and talk to me,” the General Secretary said.

Tulsie responds

“Firstly I want to thank him because if he’s asking me to go back to Guyana and deal with the issues there, then he must be admitting that I have the ability to solve complex problems. I want to thank him for that acknowledgement,” said Tulsie in an interview with reporter Tresha Lionel. Tulsie says he is also disappointed that this is the level of thinking at the highest level of the party.

“It’s scary if that’s how they think. It’s scary for where the country is going. I am not disappointed with what he said because I don’t expect better of him but I am worried about the country because if the party at the highest level is thinking that way, we’re in a very dark place,” Tulsie stated.

The director indicated that he moved to Saint Lucia in 1980 and believes that he has made a contribution to the country. He is determined not to let the “noise that’s going on now distract me from the contribution I feel I can continue to make.”

He went on: “Saint Lucia’s my home. I’ve adopted Saint Lucia and Saint Lucians have adopted me, and I’m grateful for that. I do the best I can in whatever job I’m in and that’s what drives me. I’m currently in a job which is with an organization that was created to find a balance between conservation and development, and as long as I’m in that job, that is what I’ll do.”

The director acknowledged that this may bring the Trust into disagreements with some people and organizations, but credited former prime minister Sir John Compton for seeing the need for the SLNT to serve as a “balancing voice” in the country’s development.

Tulsie stressed that he has no political ambitions and is not a member of any political party. He says that he will block out the noise, look at the bigger picture and continue to do his job.